Harry Potter and the Forests Secret
by plesner83
Summary: Post OOTP. Harry is having trouble coping with the loss of his beloved Godfather, but gets help from the person he expected the least. He finds a new will to confront the perils facing him, but he has lost his will to endanger his friends. ABANDONED ATM.
1. A Nightly Visit

Chapter 1: A Nightly Visit

It was an early July morning, and the sun was slowly beginning to rise over Privet Drive. The air was dry, and even the birds seemed too exhausted from the immense heat to be willing to sing. It hadn't rained for more than a fortnight, and the normally meticulously kept gardens of Little Whinging were now dryer and more yellowish than ever. Instead of the birds merrily singing the only sound that could be heard was the soft humming of innumerable air conditioners. All the inhabitants of this quiet and perfect little neighbourhood were sound asleep in their perfect little homes, in their perfect little beds, enjoying the perfect artificially cooled air coming from their perfect air conditioning apparatuses.

That's all except one. Harry Potter of number 4 Privet Drive awoke with a tremendous ear-splitting scream, sweating and panting, and completely entangled in his sheets. Harry had had another nightmare about his godfather's death. Harry had these nightmares every night since that horrible day in May. Every night Harry would re-experience the events in the Department of Mysteries, leading up to the part where Sirius would mock his cousin Bellatrix, and she would hit him with that fatal stunner. Sirius would gracefully fall backwards trough the veil, and Harry would wake up screaming out all of his sorrow and anger. And every morning Harry's uncle would come trampling into his room and scream Harry's ears off about what a freak and degenerate misguided youth he was. Harry would apologise and internally curse the fact that he couldn't put a silencing charm on his room because of the restriction of underage magic.

When his uncle Vernon was done screaming, he would stomp out of the room and shout over his shoulder that "Harry better not show his face today, or else…". Harry really wasn't scared of his uncle, but nevertheless he stayed as far away from the Dursleys as he could. All he really wanted to do was to lie down and die. The memory of Sirius was all that was on his mind, and he felt an immense amount of guilt. Many times during the day Harry would just break down and cry his heart out for his godfather, but nothing seemed to help his feeling of sorrow and guilt.

That's how mostly every day had been for Harry since his uncle and aunt had picked him up at Kings Cross at the end of the school year. He would wake up screaming, spend his day in his room crying in his bed, or sitting at his desk looking out of his window, without ever seeing anything. In the evening his aunt would push a bowl of soup and a piece of bread trough the cat flap his uncle had installed in his second year, but mostly Harry only ate the bread and took a spoonful or two of the soup. Then he would push the bowl back out trough the cat flap and lie down on his bed and cry himself to sleep. During the night he would wake crying from various nightmares he never could remember. And in the morning he would always wake up screaming after seeing Sirius die yet another time.

The door to his room was never locked, but Harry really didn't want to see his so called family, and he was pretty sure that they were happy with the fact that he only left his room once a day to go to the toilet. After living like this for weeks Harry was getting very thin and looked very ill. He had blue and black rings under his eyes and he was almost ghostly pale.

In the start of his summer, Harry's friends had sent him letters every day, but after a series of particularly pushy letters from Ron and Hermione demanding to know how he was and how he was handling everything; Harry had begun to just send the letters back unopened. After he started this practise the letters didn't come nearly as often, but he could tell that they were getting longer and longer. But he just couldn't bring himself to care. He wanted to be with his friends, but after witnessing Sirius die he had come to the conclusion that the only way he could protect them was to alienate them. And so he kept sending their letters back unopened.

He still sent a letter addressed to the order every tree days, but it always just said the same three words:

_I'm fine, _

_Harry_

One day as he sent his only companion, his snow white owl Hedwig, off with the usual message he wondered briefly if there were someone out there who cared and worried about him, but then quickly banished the thought from his mind and instead resigned into his usual self pity.

One night Harry was lying awake crying silently in his pillow, when he heard a faint CRACK. Automatically his hand shot out for his wand, but as soon as his mind could react, he dropped it again- He really didn't care who from the magical world was now in his room. He just lied there with his head in his pillow and waited for something to happen. He knew he should be worried about deatheaters and Voldemort, but his heart resisted every urge to begin beating faster. He just didn't care anymore – Sirius was dead and he would gladly follow him.

After a minute or two Harry heard his desk chair being pulled from his desk and sat next to his bed, and then there were the sound of someone sitting gently down.

"Harry we have to talk" came a familiar voice, a voice that Harry thought was probably then one he would have least expected to ever hear in his room in the middle of the night.

Harry had no doubt that there was a note of command in the voice, so slowly sat up, and looked into the blue eyes of his Headmaster.

Albus Dumbledore looked older and more tired than Harry could ever remember seeing, and the familiar twinkles in his eyes were completely gone.

"I'm sorry professor, but I really haven't got anything to say", Harry said as he slowly lowered his head to look at his feet.

"Then you will just have to listen to what I have to say then", said Dumbledore, now a definite tone of command in his voice.

"Harry I want you to know that I'm truly sorry about what happened to Sirius, but you need to believe that it wasn't your fault. Sirius died fighting and both you and I know that's how he would have wanted it. On top of that he died defending you, his godson, and nobody could have stopped him from coming to your aid, when he learned that you were in the Department of Mysteries. I also want you to know that I think you are making a tremendous mistake in alienating your friends Harry – they are worried sick about you, and they really deserve better than for you just to ignore them like this. But I have finally learned that I can't tell you how to live you life, so instead of lecturing you any further I've come here to offer you some advice and a means to handle Sirius's death."

At this point Harry's eyes were streaming with silent tears, and he was shaking slightly.

Dumbledore put a hand on his shoulder and kept it there for a couple of seconds, before getting up and walking over to Harry's desk. Harry could hear Dumbledore mutter something, but couldn't quite make out the words.

Dumbledore sighed, and turned towards Harry again and said, "Harry I want you to do an old man a favour. I want you to read these books for me. Learn them. And practise what you find in them. You should start with the top most one, and when you are ready, someone will let you know how to practise the information in the rest of the books."

Harry couldn't look up. He didn't want to see his Headmasters eyes without the familiar twinkle, so he just lowered his head even more, and muttered "yes sir."

"Goodbye Harry, I hope to hear of your progress with these books. If not for yourself, than do it for Sirius.", and with that Dumbledore disappeared with a silent "POP".

Harry just sat in his bed for several minuets thinking about Dumbledore's last words: "…If not for yourself, than do it for Sirius…". Dumbledore was right he thought, he would do it for Sirius – he would do anything for Sirius. Suddenly he realised he didn't have the faintest idea, what it was, that Dumbledore wanted him to do, and so with a new resolve he stood up from his bed and walked over to his desk to look at the books there. In the soft shine from the moon he read the titles of the four books on his desk.

The top one was a fitness and stamina training book, obviously bought in a muggle bookstore. Harry opened it to the first page, and found a small note scribbled inside in midnight blue ink:

_Harry start building up your strength, and spend the rest of the time while not training studying the rest of your books. If you get your strength up to an acceptable level, I will make arrangements for you to be able to train what you will learn from the other tree books._

Then he turned to the other three books. They were all very big and heavy, and as far as Harry could tell several centuries old. The first one had the, to Harry very exciting, title: "THE COMPLETE AND MOST ADVANCED GUIDE TO PRACTISE AND DEFENCE AGAINTST THE DARK ARTS". "Wow", Harry thought, "That probably isn't even in the restricted section of the library at Hogwarts"

The second book had no apparent title, but was very dusty, so Harry ran his hand over the cover to wipe the dust away. As soon as his ran had ran across the width of the cover, the old tome suddenly seemed brand new, and gold letters appeared spelling out the title of the book:

Wandless magic – You've got the skills!

A guide to the most powerful wizards of ANY time

Harry was stunned. His mind just went blank as he read the title. How did Dumbledore want him to study from THAT book? He wasn't powerful. He wasn't even especially talented. Dumbledore was loads more powerful than Harry would ever be, and he used his wand almost always. And Hermione was so much better at magic than he was. All he could think of was that Dumbledore must have given him the wrong book. He had probably meant to give him "wandless magic for dummies". "Oh well", Harry thought, "I'll just return it when I get to Hogwarts". As soon as Harry put the book down the dusty and old appearance presented itself again, and the title vanished, but Harry didn't notice, as he was already picking up the final book.

The final book looked newest of the three wizarding books, and had the title "Duelling Through The Ages", and was to Harry's surprise written by none other the Alastor Moody.

As Harry by now was wide awake, he did as Dumbledore had instructed him, and picked up the muggle training book, and started reading.

When the sun started rising, Harry was half done, and had a good basic understanding of muggle fitness training, and with the help of the book he had devised a beginners training schedule. It mostly consisted of short runs in the mornings and evenings, accompanied by some stretches. In the afternoon he would do some push ups and other muscle training exercises. He was for the first time in weeks not on the verge of tears, and if someone could see him, they would se an expression of sad determination. He changed in to some of his baggy sweatpants, and wore a hooded jumper over a t-shirt.

30 minuets later Harry was back in his room after his first ever morning run – and he felt as if he was ready to die. His entire body hurt more than he would have ever dreamed possible after just doing a bit of running. But he was determined not to let Sirius down again, so he did his stretches, and went to take a shower.

Before the Dursleys woke up he went down to the kitchen and ate two large slices of bread with cheese on, and an apple. The book said he needed to eat to have energy to burn, so he had decided to eat as much as possible, even though it made him feel like throwing up.


	2. The book and the “kid”napping

Chapter 2: The book and the "kid"napping

When the Dursleys woke up that morning without Harry as their extremely annoying alarm clock, all three of them poked their heads in to see why Harry hadn't screamed yet, and when they saw him lying on his bed reading Dudley taunted Harry, but was silenced when he saw the look of pure hatred he got from his cousin. Vernon immediately burst into a screaming fit about Harry treating his family with respect, but Harry just turned away and resumed reading his duelling book.

In the week that had passed since Dumbledore's visit, Harry had nothing on his mind other than his training and reading in his new books. On his third day of training he realised that the food he was able to get his hands on at the Dursleys wasn't going to be enough to help him build the muscle mass he needed, so he dug deep into his trunk and tried to find some muggle money. But all he was able to find was a couple of pounds, and he knew that wasn't going to go very far. In frustration he picked up his moneybag, which was still a quarter full of Galleons, Sickles and Knuts, and threw it as hard as he could across the room.

As soon as he let go of it he regretted it, as he could easily imagine the noise it would make when the many heavy coins hit the wall. In the split second before the pouch hit the wall his only wish was that it had been full of crisp new pound notes and not dusty old gold galleons. As the bag hit the wall above his desk nothing happened, no noise came. Puzzled Harry went over to the moneybag and picked it up, astonished at how light it was. Without thinking about it Harry opened the purse to see what was wrong, and instead of gold and silver, he found a stack of neatly folded muggle money!

At that second his owl Hedwig soared in through his window, did a circle above his head, and landed on his shoulder with a large piece of parchment attached to her leg. By now Harry didn't even think about what he did he just sent his owl of again to return the unopened letter to its sender. It had become second nature for Harry to just send the letters he got return. He didn't have time to think about trivial things as letters. All he wanted to do was study his books and do his training, so one day he would be able to avenge Sirius. He knew he didn't want to kill anyone; it was just not in him to do something like that. But he had to bring those responsible for Sirius', and his parents' death to justice. Even if was the last thing he would ever do, he would bring them to justice.

The next morning when Harry went for his morning run, he stopped in a muggle grocery store he had discovered the day before, and bought two big bags full of all the different kinds of food his training book suggested he should eat, and when he got home he stored it all safely beneath the loose floorboard in his room.

Another week had passed and Harry was starting to feel a great difference in his stamina, and he was now able to run some relative long distances without getting too tired. His reading was also coming along quite nicely, he had read a lot in both his Dark Arts book, and his duelling book, and he was surprised to find that even though he was one of the better students in his DADA class, there were loads of new spells in his book, he needed to learn, and his duelling book had lots of exercises to teach you how to dodge spells, how to fire spells faster, and also on how to "plan" a duel. He hadn't even touched his book about wandless magic since the first night, but this night Harry felt himself drawn by curiosity to the book.

He brought it over to his bed and sat down with his back against the headrest, and tried to open the book. He couldn't.

After sitting and starring at the old dusty book he remembered the first night where he had run his hand across the book, and the title had appeared. He decided it was worth a shot and he ran his hand across the cover of the old tome, and just like before gold letters appeared to show the title, and the book magically cleaned itself.

Once again Harry found himself wondering whether Dumbledore had given him the right book.

He grabbed the cover of the book prepared to try and use force to get it to open, but as soon as he even thought about opening the book it opened itself to the first page. At first the page was blank and Harry went to grab the page and turn it, but it was as if the rest of the pages in the book were glued together. Words started appearing on the page in the same neat gold print used on the cover of the book:

_I'm the ultimate guide to wandless magic._

_In order to gain knowledge from me you must command me._

_In order to command me, I must deem you powerful enough._

_If you succeed I will always serve you and none other._

_If you wish gain knowledge from me - command me!_

_Use "I command you" to open me._

"I haven't got a clue what that means, and since it's obviously a magical book, I probably need to use magic to do it, the only problem is I can't use magic outside school" Harry muttered to himself. To his surprise, the book seemed to "answer" his question, as words immediately appeared bellow the first lines.

_Wandless magic is not monitored by the Ministry of Magic._

_They don't think anyone as young as you will be able._

_If they knew just what you're capable of Harry James Potter..._

_Now – Point at me and say "I command you"._

_Remember you must desire for me to open, or it won't work._

Harry knew very well that he wasn't supposed to trust anything with a mind of its own, but he thought that since Dumbledore had brought him the book, it probably wasn't harmful. He decided to ask one more question before trying anything. Just as the thought formed in his head "Will anything happen if I'm not powerful enough", words again appeared in the book.

_I will close, for the duration of one year._

_At that time you can try and open me again if you desire._

_But don't worry about that._

_Now – Point at me and say "I command you"._

_Remember you most desire for me to open, or it won't work._

As the book repeated it's instruction at the bottom of the page, Harry was fairly sure, that the book was trying to hint to him, that he would be able to open it. So without any further thoughts about underage magic and evil books, he pointed his right hand and index finger at the book and said with a firm voice "I command you".

Immediately a bright golden and red light sprang from the centre of the book and completely surrounded Harry and the book. Harry felt an enormous surge of power flow trough him and he thought he could hear a voice in his head much similar to the voice of the Hogwarts sorting hat. "_Yes, great power he has. Great Power. And destined to do great things too. Oh and he has the skill – he has shown it already. Yes he will do fine. No – that's not true. Not fine – he will do wonderful. I'm most lucky to have such a great apprentice. Yes – I accept you Harry James Potter as my sole apprentice._"

As the voice in his mind died out, so did the golden shine that surrounded him and the book. Instead the book snapped shut, and a soft golden glow shone from the back of the book, while golden letters inscribed themselves on the back. The letters spelled out his name in nicely swung golden letters. Harry new instantly that this book was truly _his_ now and that only he would ever be able to open it.

When the shine disappeared from the book, everything in the room went dark and silent. After a couple of seconds Harry realised he was holding his breath, and he let out a sigh, and took a deep breath. He was now looking at the old dusty tome, which he first laid his eyes on. Now more curious then ever Harry opened the book and started reading.

It was definitely the most exciting book Harry had ever opened. It was a mixture of a normal book and a clearly intelligent being. Whenever Harry didn't quite understand something, or had some kind of question, the book seemed to realize it, and just changed the text right in front of his eyes so that he found his answer in the very next line. Harry found this immensely helpful. Also the book seemed to be planning his education in wandless magic on itself. Every few pages there would be small exercise which Harry had to complete to the books satisfaction, before he could turn the page. That night Harry didn't sleep at all, but instead read on and trained without a single moments break. It was first when the sun started rising that Harry started feeling a bit sleepy – but he insisted on reading on as it was simply too exciting to stop. Apparently the book seemed to have other plans with Harry, as it suddenly refused to let him change the page, and on the bottom line insisted that Harry went to sleep and got some rest before continuing his studies. When Harry woke up later that day he immediately reached out for his book, but found that it wouldn't let him open it. In his head he heard a small voice: "_You will continue with your ordinary training schedule and you will continue studying your other books. And when you are ready, we will continue._"

Harry reluctantly got out of bed, and started his daily routine. He ate a bit of breakfast from his hidden stash, and then put on his running clothes.

The last couple of days Harry had been running for almost an hour, and he usually ended up running somewhere between 10 and 15 kilometres. He didn't leave the neighbourhood though as he was sure Dumbledore wouldn't appreciate him getting too far away from Privet Drive. So he would just run in circles.

Suddenly he realised something was wrong. It was as if someone was following him down the narrow path he was running on in the park. Harry glanced over his shoulder but couldn't see anyone there, but he was certain someone was running no more than 5 steps behind him. Harry's brain was working in overdrive, what was he going to do. There was only on thing that sprang to mind. Whoever was running behind him was clearly invisible, and if you were invisible you were clearly a wizard, and if you were a wizard running behind someone and you were descent you would introduce yourself. Harry could only think of one thing to do. And he did it. In a split second he bolted around, and stood his ground hunched over, so his "companion" would run directly into him.

As soon as he felt someone hit him, he summoned all his physical strength and sent whoever was following him flying. Almost immediately he heard a thump as a body hit the ground and when he turned he could see what seemed to be a pair of legs sticking out of thin air. "An invisibility cloak" Harry thought, right before he drew his wand and fired a stunner at the place where he figured the person following him was lying.

Harry went over to the stunned person and dragged the cloak of him.

Harry was speechless. Right there on the ground next to him laid Remus Lupin, best friend of both his parents and of his godfather. No matter what, that wasn't whom Harry had expected to find following him in an invisibility cloak! Quickly Harry calculated the odds of someone using a polyjuice potion to follow him around as his former DADA professor. In Harry's mind that didn't seem very likely, so he whispered the "enervate" spell to revive Remus, but kept his wand pointed at the chest of the man lying on the ground.

Remus seemed a bit confused for a second, and then grinned broadly at Harry.

"Hi Harry, I didn't count on you hearing me"

"How do I know you are you? You could be an impostor with the help of a Polyjuice Potion – or you could be a metamorphmagus!" Harry's thoughts were spinning as he addressed the man lying on the ground. How could he be sure this was his father's friend?

"Well, Harry that is a valid, and actually quite good question, but it fortunately has an easy solution. I can just give you some piece of information that only the real Remus Lupin knows. Let's see – When you face a Boggart, it turns into a Dementor. Will that do?"

"NO. It won't'. Any number of students could hold that piece of information. Try again. But you better make it good, I'm kind of nervous here, and I just might hex you if you don't prove you are real very soon!" Harry's voice was now sounding pretty angry, and for a second a mixture of anger and amusement played across the face of the man on the ground.

"You're quite right of course Harry. Silly me. Lets see, hmm that should do the trick. Dumbledore brought you four books one night a couple of weeks ago. If I remember it correct, one is a muggle fitness book, one is called _Duelling trough the ages_, another is called _THE COMPLETE AND MOST ADVANCED GUIDE TO PRACTISE AND DEFENCE AGAINTST THE DARK ARTS_, and the final one, I must admit, I don't even know what's about. Dumbledore wouldn't tell any of us Order members. He just assured us that if everything was as he expected, it would be very handy for you."

Harry Immediately pocketed his wand, and stretched out a hand to help his former professor of the ground. "I'm so sorry Professor Lupin, I should have known someone would be following me around!"

"That's quite all right Harry. You did the right thing. I'm just glad I got you to believe me before you tried out some of the new hexes, you most have learned from your book, on me. And please Harry, I'm not your professor anymore, so call me Remus, or if you like, Moony. But come on Harry it's not safe to talk here so I'll walk you home, under the cloak of course, and then we can talk in your room."

"Ok Professor Lu…, sorry Remus"

"No problem Harry"

Harry then started running again, and was now very aware of the steps following him close by. When they reached number 4 Privet Drive, Harry made sure to keep the door open just long enough to make sure Remus could slip in, before he closed it. Harry quickly made his way upstairs into his room, and closed the door silently behind him and Remus. As soon as Harry had closed the door Remus took of the cloak, and quickly muttered a silencing charm while waving his wand in a complex motion all around the room.

Harry recognised it as a very powerful and advanced silencing spell designed specifically for keeping entire rooms soundproof. He had read about it in one of his new books. When Remus was done, he turned around and inspected Harry from head to toe. It didn't look to Harry like he was very pleased with what he found. Remus had quickly adopted a look of concern and displeasure, when he had surveyed Harry's rather gangly frame. The fact was that even though Harry was now exercising on a regular basis, he was still dangerously thin and he looked like anyone could snap him in pieces between their fingers.

Harry hated the look on Remus' face, and didn't want to take about his health, so he tried starting a conversation, that was a bit more common ground.

"So how long have you been following me around?"

"Well Harry, we have been watching you 24/7 since the minute you left Kings Cross. At first there were loads of volunteers, but since you took up running so seriously, there has become farther and farther between the people willing to "nanny" you. Actually I'm one out of only two people who are sharing the responsibility of keeping an eye on you at all times. I'm actually not supposed to tell you this, but the other is Tonks. She really cares about you, you know. She was the one on duty when you went for your first run, and when she returned to Headquarters, they couldn't get here to stop crying for half an hour. She was so shocked by your appearance and how sick you looked. It took three order members to keep Mrs. Weasley from coming and getting you right then and there."

"I'm not going Remus. I can't go to The Burrow, it will just put everybody in danger. And I won't go to Headquarters. I'm not ready to go there. I'm not sure I ever will be, the only thing keeping me sane right now, is all of my training and studying. If I start thinking about…. him… again, I will probably loose my mind."

"You know Harry, you're not alone. If you wish to talk I'm always here. I know I can't replace Sirius, he was your godfather and I'll never be that. But I still care very much for you. As do your friends. You should talk to them. Let them help you. They are so worried about you, and you know you have to face them at Hogwarts, if not before then"

"I just can't Remus. Can't you see? They are in ten times more danger just because they know me. If I can make everybody believe that I don't care for them anymore, then maybe Voldemort will leave them alone. But I really don't want to talk about that. Dumbledore mentioned something about arranging for me to start training some of the stuff I've studied in my books when I had made enough progress in my physical training. I was wondering if you could ask him to make those arrangements? I've more or less learned all the theory in my duelling and DADA books, and I'm kind of stuck until I can get some real wand practice?"

"I don't know anything about that Harry, but I'll speak to him, and pass on your request. Now I'm afraid I must go, I have to get to Headquarters so we can come up with a plausible explanation for the use of magic in the park earlier. No worries Harry, we will make sure everything is sorted out, but now I really most go. Goodbye Harry."

And with that Remus Lupin strode out the door while in one smooth motion lifting the silencing charm, and swinging the invisibility cloak over his shoulders.

Over the next couple of days Harry grew more and more aware that someone was following him whenever he was outside the house, but so far neither Remus nor Tonks had tried to contact him and Dumbledore hadn't given any signs of letting Harry start training his duelling skills. So whenever Harry wasn't running or doing other exercises, he would practise wandless magic with his book.

In the beginning the book had him doing concentration and focusing exercises, but as he soon mastered these, the book made him practise some of the most basic spells Harry knew. The very first exercise the book had him do was actually the same as he had done on his first day at Hogwarts. Using "Wingardium Leviosa", he made his quill float around his room. After practising this for 10 minutes Harry could make the quill do loops, change direction suddenly and move at tremendous speeds.

Four hours later more or less all of Harry's belongings were floating around the room, while all Harry was doing was keeping a small amount of concentration on them, while the rest of his mind was reading in his book. The book seemed very pleased with Harry's progress and was especially impressed with the fact that he was able to keep more then 30 objects floating at various places in the room, when he at the same time kept reading. Harry wasn't worried about any of the Dursleys disturbing him, and finding him doing magic, because since his nightmares had stopped none of them had even opened the door to his room.

After a couple of more days of running and training without any word from Dumbledore as to when he could start his training sessions, Harry was growing frustrated. He really wanted to get some practise with his wand. He thoroughly enjoyed doing magic without it, but it also had its limitations. Harry found that after the initial fast progress with the Wingardium Leviosa spell, things were going much slower now as the book had him practise some slightly more advanced spells. Last night when Harry had grown extraordinarily frustrated that he didn't make any progress with the spell he was working on, and he had slammed the book shut. He regretted doing that an instant later when, the book in a bright glow roughly forced his head back to the once again open book, and made him read the words that appeared on the page in a somewhat angry writing. Basically the book explained to him, that it wouldn't accept that kind of behaviour, and that the reason he wasn't making any real progress, was that he needed to practise the spell with his wand first to get a feel for the magic. After that the book suggested in very clear terms, that it thought that Harry should get his practise arrangements in order, so they didn't waste each others time.

The next morning Harry had decided to take matters into his own hands. He wanted to speak to Dumbledore, and he wanted to speak to him now! He thought about simply telling his guard to contact Dumbledore, but figured it wouldn't work since he in a way had already tried this by asking Remus. No he needed something far more radical. But what? He couldn't just call the Knightbus and go to Hogwarts. He had no way of knowing Dumbledore would be there and going to Headquarters was also out of the question; so what to do? He needed to use the facts and assets he had available. Slowly a plan started forming in his mind. Dumbledore would probably kill him for what he was going to do, but Harry really didn't care. He needed to speak to Dumbledore!

When Harry was sure he had gone over everything in his head twice, and was certain that he could pull it of, he dug out his invisibility cloak from his trunk, and stuffed it inside his sweatshirt. Them he put on his trainers, and silently went down the stairs and out trough the front door.

Harry ran a slightly different route than he used to, and at a much greater speed, to make sure whoever was following him would have their work cut out for them. He had on one of his first early morning runs spotted an old abandoned house lying on the outskirts of town, and that was where he was headed to carry out his plan. He would have done it closer to privet drive, but it was absolutely vital that he was away from the prying eyes of muggles.

When he reached the old house he kept running right in trough the front door, trough the hallway and into the centre of the house where there wasn't any windows. As soon as he entered the room he spun around, and with a quick movement of his hand cast "Petrificus Totalus" on the person he could hear following him into the room. Following the soft thump that could be heard, which marked that someone had fallen to the ground in a full body bind, Harry quickly pulled out his wand, and cast a simple silencing spell he had read about in his new DADA book. Even though he hadn't tried it before, it fortunately seemed to work perfectly, as a single yellow ray of light emitted from the tip of his wand and struck thin air approximately 30 cm above the ground.

"Well, that was the easy part Harry thought" as he pulled out his invisibility cloak and hurriedly put it on. Now came the challenging part of levitating an invisible person all the way home, whilst keeping him self hidden under his own cloak.

It turned out it wasn't quite as difficult as Harry had feared it would be, in fact he rather enjoyed walking back slowly in the rising morning sun, listening to the birds singing, and watching the early morning people step out of their houses and make their way to work. Although Harry was now a master of "Wingardium Leviosa", he still had to use a good deal of concentration to not drop the body floating in front of him, and that resulted in the only noticeable event on the way home, when Harry almost walked right into a mailbox, as he was concentrating on the spell whilst trying the best he knew to focus on the song of a bird that sounded particularly beautiful.

When Harry neared Privet Drive he sharpened his senses to make sure nobody else from the wizarding world was around. As he came to his aunt and uncles house he stopped at the front door and looked closely around, and listened intently with one ear on the door. Everything seemed quiet, and so he opened the door silently, and quickly floated the body inside, and closed the door and pulled off his cloak in one swift motion. As Harry made his way up to his room he cursed at the noise it made when he accidentally bumped the invisible figure next to him into the wall, but fortunately the Dursleys didn't seem to wake up.

Safely back in his room Harry locked the door and floated the invisible figure onto his bed. He then took a deep breath and walked over to the bed and fumbled around a bit, until he found the hem of what he recognised as an invisibility cloak, and pulled it back. He wasn't surprised to see Remus lying there completely stiff the only thing able to move was his eyes. "Wow, if eyes could kill I would most certainly be dead by now" Harry thought, as he looked down at Remus. He quickly leaned forward and whispered while looking into Remus' eyes.

"I'm really sorry Remus, but I really need to talk to Dumbledore, and the only way I could think of to get him here were if my guard didn't turn up after his shift. I hope you can understand that. He's the only one who's ever been able to apparate in here, and he's so clever, so I hope he will be figure out what has happened, or at least come to talk to me to see if I know what happened to you. I really am sorry Remus, but I have to cover you up again, in case the muggles should come in here for some reason."

Remus' eyes didn't look nearly as deadly anymore Harry thought, and if you really tried hard, they maybe even showed a bit of understanding. Harry covered up Remus in the cloak again after he had made sure he was as relatively comfortable as possible when you're in a full body bind.

Harry had removed the silencing spell without the use of his wand with the "Finate Incantatem" spell, as this was one of the spells the book had succeeded in teaching him before he came to this standstill. He wasn't too worried about the fact that he had used his wand when cast the silencing charm in the first place, as he did it in a house that was all the way across town, where he really shouldn't have any business. And anyway he figured Dumbledore would soon be around and then he could tell him everything. Well maybe he would wait until he had done a bit of shouting, and made it clear to Dumbledore, that he wanted a place to train, and he wanted it soon.


	3. An early present

Chapter 3: An early present

Things didn't go quite as Harry expected.

When the day started to come to an end, and the sun begun to set, Harry was becoming more and more aggravated with the fact that nothing had happened yet. He had figured that Remus would change watches with Tonks right after he had finished his run, so he could go and get a shower, and if that was the case, then someone would defiantly have realised by now, that Remus was missing.

What Harry didn't realise, and by the way had no way of knowing, was that by now the entire order was mobilised in the search for Remus. They had quickly realised that Harry was in his room, and feared that Remus somehow had been captured by Voldemort's Death Eaters. As Harry sat in his room and wondered why nothing happened, there were no less than 4 order members stationed around the house, while the rest were searching for Remus.

When the sun finally set, Harry decided that he need to do something, and he settled on writing a quick, but not too specific letter to the order. Harry spent a couple of minutes wondering how he could get the message trough to the order, without writing something that Voldemort could use, if the letter was intercepted. In the end he decided on:

_I Have him, send Dumbledore._

_H._

He rolled up the parchment, and went over to Hedwig who was sitting in her cage, sleeping with her head under her wing. Harry gently stroked her snowy white feathers, and looked fatherly at her. He really loved that owl. He knew she would always follow him, and always be his friend. Right now she was his only friend. Hedwig woke with a soft hoot, and looked expectantly up at Harry.

"Are you up for a flight, Hedwig? I really need you to get this letter to someone from the order as fast as possible. It doesn't matter whom, just someone from the order. Can you do that?" Harry said softly. Hedwig looked at him with resentment in her eyes and softly nipped his index finger. Harry laughed. "I know, I know. I didn't mean you weren't capable, I just wanted to be polite." Hedwig again hooted softly, and stuck out her leg. Harry tied up the letter and carried her over to the window, opened it and sent her off. Then he went over and sat down at his desk with his head in his hand and wondered how long it would take Hedwig….. Harry's thoughts were interrupted by a fairly large pop, just 45 seconds after he had sent Hedwig of.

Harry spun around in his chair, and cringed under the eyes of an absolutely furious Dumbledore.

"Where is he?" Dumbledore spoke with thunder in his voice.

Harry was stunned. He was the one that was supposed to do the shouting and be the angry one, but realised that it would probably be the best thing to just answer Dumbledore, and so he muttered, "Behind you Sir, on the bed" in a barely audible whisper.

Dumbledore spun around, and stepped over to the bed, where he pulled the invisibility cloak of Remus. Harry quickly got up from his chair and went over to the bed and stood next to Dumbledore. Dumbledore turned his gaze to Harry, and his eyes spoke more than Harry needed to hear. They showed relief, anger, sorrow, immense disappointment and most of all command. Harry wasn't in doubt of what Dumbledore wanted to do, so with a single wriggle of his finger he lifted the spell that had kept Remus subdued the entire day.

Dumbledore helped Remus sit up, and softly asked him if he was alright. Remus answered that he was okay, just a little sore, and his joints were a bit stiff. Then with a very firm voice, he sent Remus back to headquarters to get a check-up and assured him that in time he would get his turn at shouting at Harry. As Remus stepped over to the door, Harry softly whispered "I'm sorry Remus". Remus stopped for a less than a second, gave a small nod, and then went out the door without even turning. Harry felt ashamed of himself. He hoped Remus would be able to forgive him over time.

Dumbledore sat down on Harry's bed with a sigh and his head hung low. Without looking up he pulled out his wand, and cast several silencing spells on the entire room. Harry only recognised a couple of them. When he was done, he gestured for Harry to sit next to him and still without looking up he told Harry to start explaining.

Harry sat down, hid his head in his hands for a moment, and then started to explain everything that had happened that day. How he had run a different route, lured Remus into the abandoned house, levitated him all the way home hidden under a cloak each, and how he had waited all day. As Harry finished his tale, Dumbledore looked up at Harry with a funny look in his eyes. Harry couldn't quite put his finger on what it was. Dumbledore only said one word, the word that Harry had knew would come, and which he hoped he had an adequate answer to. "Why?"

Harry then started telling Dumbledore more or less everything he had experienced with the book since the night Dumbledore had visited him the first time and finished up by retelling the night before in detail, and stressing how frustrated he was, that he couldn't get any further in his training.

When Harry finished his story he almost begged Dumbledore to make it possible for him to get some more training done, but stressed that he wasn't under any circumstances going to Headquarters.

When Harry stopped talking, complete silence fell upon the room for several minutes. Harry didn't dare look up, and didn't dare speak to Dumbledore.

Finally Dumbledore sighed, straightened him self up and started speaking. "You should know Harry that I'm very disappointed in you. What you did caused us all a lot of worry, and the entire order was mobilised in an effort to find out what happened to Remus. As we speak there are no less the four order members outside guarding this house in case Death Eaters were coming for you. I can understand that you needed to speak to me, and I can understand you were frustrated that I didn't come sooner, even though you asked Remus to tell me that you wanted to speak to me. But I must say that I do not approve of your way of getting my attention. That said I want to apologise to you."

"What? You want to apologise to me?" Harry burst out.

"Yes Harry, I feel I need to tell you that I'm sorry that I have underestimated you. I wasn't sure you could even open your book. As you have probably figured out by now, only wizards with the ability to do wandless magic can open the book, and I certainly didn't expect you to catch on so fast that you already need to have a place where you can practise along with your wand. This I must admit is due to my own arrogance. You see when I first started training in doing magic without my wand, it took me far longer than you to even get the slightest bit of progress, and I even had help, so you see I thought it would be months before you got to where you are now. It was an old man's mistake. I must admit that there is a very real possibility, that if you keep up your practise, then at the end of this year, you will be far more capable than me in this art of magic. I really am very proud of you."

"Ehh… Thank you Sir." Harry stammered.

"I'm not finished Harry. So you see these last minutes I've had a lot of thinking to do. You are of course right that you need a place to practise, and I'll see to that immediately. Although I must warn you that it will probably take me at least a couple of days to have appropriate and safe arrangements made, but I promise you that I will contact you no later than Friday, 5 days from now, no matter what progress I have made."

"Thank you Sir. I understand. There is one more thing thought that I have wanted to ask you." Harry said, and then he told Dumbledore about the incident with him turning his gold into muggle money, and finished off by saying, "I didn't think that was possible Sir. I didn't think you could magically manipulate money?"

"Well Harry It does sound a bit strange, and I'll have to look into it, but it seems more and more certain, that you are a very powerful wizard indeed. But now I really must go Harry. Keep up with your training as best as you can, and I'll contact you as soon as possible. And please don't go and abduct any more of the members of the order!" Dumbledore finished with a small chuckle, and the familiar twinkle back in his eyes.

"Bye professor. I hope to see you soon."

"Goodbye Harry"

The next three days went on in a blur for Harry. If anyone asked him later what he had done, he wouldn't have been able to tell them. Fortunately enough, nobody did. When Wednesday evening came around, and Harry was sitting around in his room doing nothing much but looking out the window watching the sun set, Hedwig soared into his room trough the open window. She silently glided around in a circle above his head for a couple of seconds, and then swept down onto his shoulder. In her beak she had a small piece of parchment, which she dropped in Harry's lap, and then nipped his ear gently.

"Hi girl, who send this for me? Harry said as he stood up with Hedwig still on his shoulder. With the piece of parchment in one hand he went over to his trunk and went trough it with the other, until he found some owl treats for Hedwig. "You know you can't live solely on these owl treats. If you want you can fly out and see if you can find some mice or something else. Or you can stay here and keep me company. I guess I feel a bit lonely when you're not here."

Hedwig gave a small hoot and squeezed Harry's shoulder gently and stayed firmly where she was.

Harry sat down on his bed, and folded open the piece of parchment. It was a very short note with only one line on it.

_Be ready at midnight!_

Harry stared at the note for a bit then crumbled it up and threw it in the garbage bin under the table. He wondered who had sent the note but figured it probably was from Dumbledore, since he was the only one who had ever visited him in his room. Then he wondered what be ready meant. Did it mean he was going somewhere? Or just that he needed to be awake? He concluded that the best thing to do was just to go to sleep early, and set his alarm clock for 23.30. Then he would have time to wake up and get some clothes ready in case he was going out.

Harry only slept very lightly, too excited about the prospect of maybe getting to see where he would be training. When his alarm clock started ringing, he quickly shut it off before the Dursleys would wake up, and then he got out of bed and dressed. Then he got out his invisibility cloak and put it down on his bed. He would need if they were going somewhere. They probably were, Harry thought. After all, all this time he hadn't been able to train in his room and as far as he knew nothing had changed about that.

A quarter to midnight, Harry had made all the preparations he could possibly think of - which wasn't many, and he sat at his desk tapping his fingers on his thigh. The minutes seemed to crawl away at an incredible slow pace, and Harry just stared out of his window. It was nearly full moon. Harry wondered how Remus was doing. As soon as he thought of Remus a feeling of guilt washed over him, as he thought of how had abducted him just to fulfil his selfish purposes. He hoped he soon would have the opportunity to apologise. As Harry looked at his alarm clock, the figures changed from23:59 to show 00:00 and with a soft "POP", Dumbledore appeared before him.

Harry was thankful to see that Dumbledore was smiling, and he stood up and greeted the headmaster.

"Good evening Sir. Are we going somewhere? I have got my invisibility cloak and everything ready."

"Good evening to you to, Harry. No I'm afraid we aren't going anywhere. I'm sad to say that we haven't been able to secure a training facility for you anywhere in the neighbourhood. Everywhere we looked is simply too dangerous. We have reason to believe that Voldemort is keeping a close eye on you, and while you still may continue with your early morning runs, it wouldn't be wise to let you train anywhere outside this house. And that, as you know presents a bit of a problem."

Harry was about to cry. He had had his hopes up too high. He really had believed that Dumbledore would find a suitable place for him to continue his training. "That's all right Sir. I know you did your best. I'll just have to wait until I get back to school." Harry said in his saddest voice.

Harry was baffled be the response he got from the headmaster. He chuckled. CHUCKLED! How could he just stand there and as good as laugh at him? Harry was about ready to explode when Dumbledore spoke.

"Calm down Harry. Think about what I just said. It does present a problem for you to train inside this house, and I must admit I wasn't capable of coming up with a solution to that problem. But that doesn't mean that everybody else wasn't." As Dumbledore said this, he pulled a very small object from inside hid robes, and handed it to Harry.

"What is this, Sir?

"This, Harry is your birthday present form The Order of the Phoenix. It was made especially for you, and only you can use it. It was actually Moody's idea. He is in fact much cleverer than most people give him credit for."

"But my birthday isn't for another week. And what is it? And what do you mean use it? What's it for?"

"Well Harry. The order decided, well that is I decided, that it would be best to give you this as soon as possible, as it will help you with your training. As to what it is, and how to use it, I hope you will be pleased. I must admit it did cost a fairly large amount of gold to have it made for you, and I must admit that I'm very proud of Alastor for coming up with this idea. What you have in your hand Harry, is your new magical trunk. It will shrink and enlarge at your will. Just hold your hand like you would be holding a suitcase, and concentrate on willing it to enlarge. Go ahead and try it now."

Harry held his arm down his side, closed his eyes and thought about enlarging the trunk in his hand. He couldn't feel anything, so he concentrated even harder.

Dumbledore cleared his throat. "Ehh what are you doing Harry?"

"I'm trying to make this work, but I must be doing something wrong, I can't feel any difference" Harry answered with his face still screwed up in concentration.

"Well then you should try and open your eyes Harry. There is a permanent weight lightening charm on it so, it won't feel a bit heavier when it's large. It's really rather practical." Dumbledore said with a small laugh.

"Oh!" was all Harry could say as he opened his eyes and looked down on the trunk standing on the floor next tom him. It was deep red with golden corners. It had one standard looking lock on the far left, and instead of six more locks like on Moody's trunk, it had a single beautifully engraved golden griffin on the right side. "What's special about it Sir? Harry asked.

"Well Harry, why don't you see for your self? Here is the key to the first lock. The second one you just need to touch, and then it will open. This lock is very special, and is made with a very old spell, so that it will only open to you, and nobody else. That is until the day you die. Then anyone who is a blood relative of you will be able to open it." Dumbledore said, as he handed Harry a small golden key.

Harry took the key and put it in the lock and turned it. With a metallic "_click_" the lid slowly opened and revealed the inside of the trunk. It looked just like the inside of every other trunk. It was completely empty.

"The Order figured that you needed a place keep your usual school books, clothes and broom. The rest of your things you will probably want to keep in the other part of the trunk." Dumbledore said with a small chuckle.

"But I haven't got any broom professor. Umbridge confiscated it. And I really don't need it when I can't play Quidditch." Harry said with a deep sigh.

"Now now Harry. All the decrees and bans Dolores Umbridge instated have been revoked. Although I'm sad to say that the spot as seeker belongs to Miss Weasley as long as she wants to keep it, or until your head of house decides to have a new round of tryouts. But you don't need to worry about that just yet. Now, I think you should try the second room. I hope it meets the specifications we asked for. You will probably enjoy it." Harry noticed that Dumbledore's eyes were tinkling mischievously, unlike anything he had ever seen before. Neither the Weasley twins nor Sirius had ever pulled of a face like that.

Harry's heart immediately dropped into the deepest pit of his stomach at the thought of his godfather. It had been so long since he had thought about him. All his training had effectively kept him from thinking of Sirius. Just as Harry had wanted it. Now all the thoughts came rushing back, and flooded Harry's feelings. He felt himself sinking deeper and deeper into despair, as he thought of all the death and suffering he had caused. First his parents had died trying to defend him, then in his first year at Hogwarts; he had brought Ron and Hermione into terrible danger, when trying to rescue the Philosophers Stone. In his second year Ginny had almost died, as Tom Riddle had used her to get his body back, and to get to Harry. In his third year his friends had been with him again, when he had faced Peter Pettigrew and Remus in his werewolf form. And at the end of the Tri Wizard Tournament, Cedric had died, because Harry had insisted they took the trophy together. Then Voldemort had returned, bringing death and despair in his wake. And last year he had brought so many of his friends into the Ministry of Magic, where they had all been hurt.

As the images of Sirius' death once again played trough his mind, Harry dropped to his knees and wept. He had lost the closest thing to a father he had ever had. As the images slowly faded away in his mind, Harry decided that he didn't want to go back to Hogwarts this year. Even though he could barely stand the thought of not returning to the closest thing to a home he could remember, he knew he just couldn't live with himself, if he brought any more danger upon his friends. He would just keep ignoring their letters, and then he would refuse to go back to school. It shouldn't be a problem to get the Dursleys to play along with that Harry thought. They would probably be more than happy to send him to St. Brutus.

Dumbledore watched Harry's grin as he looked into his eyes, and just as sudden as the grin had appeared, Dumbledore watched in horror as Harry's eyes became filled with sorrow, and his look became distant. Dumbledore could see the emotion almost radiating of Harry, and he decided it might be best if he listened in on Harry's thoughts for a bit. He heard everything Harry thought in his own head as clear as if Harry had been speaking to him. He had clearly not mastered Occlumency yet but that didn't bother Dumbledore one bit at the moment. Harry's mind was relatively safe as long as he stayed with the Dursleys. There would be time enough to train him before he returned to school. If he would return to school Dumbledore corrected himself. Harry seemed to be deadly serious about protecting his friends at all costs. It would probably be difficult to convince him that he needed to return to school, but he had to succeed. After all Harry was the only hope they ever had of defeating Voldemort.

Dumbledore put a fatherly hand on Harry's shoulder. He knew that Harry didn't trust him yet, after the fiasco last year. It had taken him a good deal of time, to get his office to resemble anything that was worthy of the headmaster of Hogwarts after Harry's last visit, but Dumbledore wasn't angry with him. In fact he was angrier with himself, because of all the mistakes he had made with this wonderful young man in front of him over the years. He didn't want to add one more now.

"Harry, I know what you're thinking, but it simply isn't true. All those things are not your fault. You have to believe me. Your friends love you and would follow you anywhere. And nobody could have stopped Sirius from coming to your aid when he learned that you were in danger. I don't want to discuss this – you just need to accept it. What you do with your friends I'm afraid I can't dictate although I might wish I could. But I would strongly suggest you do not pick the path you are leaning to. It will make you weaker. What I can decide however, is that you will be going back to school, even if I have to drag you there myself. You know the prophecy Harry. We depend on you – all of us. If you don't finish your training, Voldemort _will_ kill you, and all will be lost. We will all be killed, or forced to bow to Voldemort."

Harry looked up at Dumbledore, tears still streaming down his cheeks. "I know professor, but it's just so hard to believe. I know Sirius wanted to come, but it shouldn't have ended the way it did. Now I don't have anyone left." Harry sobbed for a minute, and then continued. "But no matter what you say, I won't be going back to school. Voldemort wants me, and it's just too dangerous for the other students if I go back. It's not that I want to give up I just can't go back there. Can't you arrange it so that someone from the order can train me? Or can I go to another school? Anything professor? I don't want to endanger the Weasleys and Hermione."

"I'm sorry Harry, but I can't do that. You need to go to Hogwarts. You need your training, not only in DADA, but in all your other subjects as well. And there is the matter of your safety. There is no place more secure for you, than Hogwarts, when you're not staying here. So as you see, you need to go back."

Harry just sat there on the floor thinking for a while. How he wished he could live a normal and cheerful life without the faith of the world on his shoulders. He wished he could live a life like the Weasleys, they were always happy. Or maybe like Tonks. She too seemed to be eternally happy, even though she had a dangerous job. Suddenly an idea sprang into Harry's mind.

Dumbledore watched Harry sit on the floor, clearly in deep thought. After some time the boy's eyes suddenly lit up like a Christmas tree. Dumbledore felt confident that he had just had an idea, and he wasn't sure he was going to like it.

"Professor Dumbledore", Harry started tentatively, "Can you please tell me a little about the Metamorphmagus? You know like Tonks is.?"

"Well I don't have a lot of time Harry, and we still have some business to attend to with your new trunk."

"Please Sir, it's important. I think I remember Tonks telling me once, that it isn't possible to become a Metamorphmagus, that you need to be born as one. Is this true?"

Dumbledore eyed Harry curiously. "Yes Harry that is true. There isn't any way of making a person into a Metamorphmagus. Why do you ask?"

"Well I guess it's not important then. I just thought that if I could become a Metamorphmagus, I could go back to school as someone else, and nobody but you would know where I was. That way my friends would be safe, the order wouldn't need to guard me all the time and Voldemort would spend loads of time searching after me, when he heard I wasn't at school." Harry sighed. "But I guess it doesn't matter when it's not possible."

Dumbledore looked at Harry in shock. "Would you want to do that Harry, even if it was possible?" _That boy never stops to amaze me_ Dumbledore thought.

"Yes Sir I think I would. I know it would be hard to pretend I didn't know anyone there, but at least I would know my friends would be safe. And I would get to see them every day, even though they couldn't know it was me. It would probably be difficult to act like a totally different person in front of them, and there would be loads of other problems too I guess, but it would still be better than just going back to school, and ignoring everyone. But never mind Sir; it can't be done so what's the point of thinking about it."

Harry stood up, and moved to touch the trunks phoenix lock.

"Wait a second Harry, before you continue. You need to listen very careful to what I'm about to tell you." Dumbledore paused as he waited until he was sure he had Harry's full attention. "I want you to think about what you just said Harry. If there _was_ a way to do what you just suggested, would you want to do it? It would be very difficult, and highly dangerous. I need you to take 5 minutes to consider this very carefully. Would you be willing to sacrifice your usual way of life to keep your friends safe? To keep the school safe? I'll leave you to think about this for 5 minutes, and when I come back, we will discuss you decision and we will finish examining your gift. Now think hard about this Harry." Dumbledore looked sternly at Harry as he said the last sentence, and then disappeared with a soft pop.

Harry slumped down on his bed with a maelstrom of thoughts banging at the inside of his skull. He hadn't really thought about the idea, it had just popped into his mind, and he had blurted it out to Dumbledore without considering it the slightest.

Harry started thinking about the pros and cons of the whole thing. It would be positive that his friends would probably be safer from Voldemort this way. It was also positive that he could spend some time with them. It would on the other hand also be quite difficult for him living with them every day, and having to lie about everything. His life would become nothing but deception. Did he really want that? The obvious answer was no. His life was difficult enough as it was, he didn't want to endure this on top of everything else.

As soon as Harry had finished that thought, his conscience kicked into gear. It didn't matter what he want. He was supposed to rid the world of Voldemort's terror. And he would rather live a life in deceit and keep his friends safe, than having a good time for a few months, until one of his friends were hurt. On the upside was the fact that he didn't have to face Cho either. He hadn't thought about her since they had gone to the ministry, and he was actually thankful for that. He didn't want to see her crying again. So it's decided he asked himself?

At this moment Dumbledore chose to reappear in his room.

"Hello again Harry. I don't want you to tell me what you have decided just yet. I think it is time for us to explore your trunk, I'm sure it holds a surprise or two, and when you have seen it, I will explain something to you, and then you can make your final decision. Ok?"

"Yes professor Dumbledore." Harry still found it hard to trust Dumbledore. He wasn't sure he would ever be able to forgive him, for keeping so much from him, but whenever Dumbledore were around he felt safe, and Dumbledore had a kind of aura of trust emitting from him, that Harry found it hard to ignore.

Harry stood up and walked over to Dumbledore who stood patiently waiting next to Harry's trunk. "So I just put my hand on it, and it'll open?" Harry asked.

"Yes that should be all it should take, although I might warn you that you might feel a bit of a sting as you touch it for the first time. This happens because the lock will absorb a tiny bit of your magic for the purpose of future recognition, and it will transfer a bit of its own magic to you, so that you'll always know where it is." Dumbledore smiled reassuringly at Harry as his face suddenly didn't show quite the same amount of eager anticipation.

Harry slowly reached out his arm and gently touched the golden phoenix on the trunk. Immediately he felt a surge of power flow from him and into the suitcase, only to return to him with a bit of an extra sting moments later. As the exchange of power came to a halt, the lock glowed with a bright red light, and Harry heard a single trill of a phoenix in his mind.

With a soft click the trunks lid slid open, and revealed a pit of darkness. The only thing Harry could see was what looked like the top steps of a wooden ladder. He looked inquisitively at Dumbledore, only to see the familiar twinkle in the headmaster's eyes, as Dumbledore motioned for Harry to climb down the ladder. Harry shrugged and stepped into his trunk while thinking _well this is certainly something I never thought I would do_.

As Harry descended the ladder soft candlelight suddenly appeared at the foot of the ladder. Harry could see and feel the exquisite quality of the mahogany wood the ladder was made of. Behind the ladder was a beautiful wooden wall obviously made in cherry wood. As Harry reached the bottom, he turned around, and stopped dead in his tracks. His eyes almost popped out of his head. He knew space could be magically enhanced, but he had never imagined something like this to be possible.

Harry turned around and watched Dumbledore quickly climb down the ladder, as thought he were a young athlete around Harry's age, and not a wizard with a good deal more than 100 years behind him. Harry was very impressed with Dumbledore's apparent agility, but he was stunned to see the look on his headmaster's face, when he turned around. Harry had never seen Dumbledore loose control of his facial expression like this before. Harry didn't doubt for one moment that this wasn't what Dumbledore had expected.

It appeared they had stepped into a small apartment. They stood in what was clearly a living room. It had a wall to wall carpet in a deep red colour that complemented the cherry red wooden walls very well. There were several comfortable looking armchairs, and a large couch in front of a big dark marble fireplace. In the back of the room there was a round table with 12 comfortable meeting chairs around. There were three doors in the room, each of which was in the same exquisite mahogany, as the ladder. Every few meters along the open walls stood suits of armour which looked brand new. In between the armours were either hung beautiful paintings or ancient weapons that looked in mint condition. The light in the room came from several wall mounted candles, and from the fire that was merely cracking.

Harry looked back at Dumbledore with huge eyes. "Wow", was the only word he could speak.

Dumbledore looked at him, and nodded his head softly. "I couldn't agree more with you Harry. As you no doubt have noticed I'm at least as surprised at this as you are. What we ordered was for this to be transformed into a magical training area for you. At least that is what I told Fred and George to get when I sent them to buy this. It appears they have made some alterations to that plan. But we will find out about all that later. For now I suggest that we take a look around and see what further surprises await."

Harry just nodded and walk over to the nearest door, which to Harry's surprise turned out to be a double door. He hadn't been able to see that from where he was standing. Engraved in the two doors were the words _TRAINING HALL_. Harry slowly pushed the door open and found a large open room similar styled as the previous, only instead of a carpet, there was a bare mahogany floor. The room was completely empty, except for some muggle weight training equipment in one of the corners.

Harry walked back into the living room, and quickly examined the other two rooms. The door nearest to the table led to a small kitchen which apparently held all the basic necessities for cooking a decent meal. The last door led to a small hallway, with two doors. Behind the door to the left was a small toilet with a shower, and the other door led to a bedroom. The bedroom mimicked the living room in appearance, with a soft red carpet, and the cherry red walls. On one side of the room was a large four-poster, easily big enough for two people. It was made of the same mahogany wood as the doors and the ladder, and had bed hangings that matched the carpet. The covers and sheet was dark red, almost maroon with a large golden griffin weaved into the silk like fabric. On the other side of the room there was a small study desk standing before a large magical window. The window appeared to be showing the view from one of Hogwarts highest towers. It showed the lake, and some of the forbidden forest, and Harry could see the giant squid playing in the water. To the side of the table was a big bookcase which was filled with books, none of which Harry had seen before. Finally across from the door was a small cupboard, which was empty, which had a full-size mirror on the inside of one of the doors. As soon as Harry looked at him self in the mirror, it exclaimed: "Straighten your clothes out boy! Stand up straight! You look about as scruffy as a malnourished back ally cat!"

Harry slammed the door to the closet closed to Dumbledore's great amusement.

Harry and Dumbledore had spent 20 minutes looking over the entire apartment, when Dumbledore led Harry to two of the large chairs in front of the fire. Harry still couldn't believe this was all his, but he decide if it really was he wouldn't spend any time out of his new "home" if he could help it.

"Is this really all for me professor? I mean it's not like I'm not grateful – it's amazing, but this must have cost a fortune!" Harry asked tentatively

"Well I must say that I'm at least as impressed with this as you are. This was never what I had in mind, but I think it will prove extremely useful if we are to carry out your idea. I think the best way to find out what the thought behind all this is, is to get the Weasley twins here and explain in to us as it was those two who purchased this on behalf of the order. "

"Excuse me Sir, but I didn't think it was possible for anyone but you to apparate into my aunt and uncles house? I've actually wondered since the first time you visited how that is possible. I didn't think it was possible to make an anti apparition spell that allowed certain people to pass though?" Harry asked with a perplexed expression on his face.

"Yes Harry it is true that it usually isn't possible to create such a specific spell, but it isn't true however that I'm the only one to be able to apparate in and out of this house. There is one other person who is capable of this, although he himself isn't aware of this as far as I know. Can you guess who that person is Harry?" Dumbledore said with a mischievous grin.

"There is someone else" Harry said flustered. "Who is it? Is it someone we can trust? Someone safe? As much as I don't like my family, I don't want any harm to come to them."

"Oh I'm sure he can be trusted. In fact I think that if we can put our trust in anyone, it's him. But tell me Harry can't you guess who it is?"

Harry sat there silent for a moment and pounded his brain for an answer. He didn't want to disappoint Dumbledore, but he simply couldn't come up with someone that fit into Dumbledore's description.

"I'm sorry Sir but I can't. And I don't understand why you would let anyone else be able to do that too?" Harry just didn't understand it. Who would Dumbledore find so trustable, that he would include them in this spell. He just begged it wasn't Snape.

"Oh well that's too bad" Dumbledore said. "You will know soon enough Harry, but I promise you that it's someone whom you would trust without hesitation. But as this person is neither Fred nor George Weasley, you might want to know how I plan on bringing them here. You see when we first came up with the idea of getting you this trunk; we needed a way to transport people directly here to train you. So it was always the plan that you would have a fireplace in the training room. We used the very same spell the ministry of magic uses to keep the floo-network in place. Your trunk is connected to only two other fireplaces, the living room fireplace at Grimmauld place, and my own at Hogwarts. To keep this private floo network safe, the two other fireplaces have been removed and shielded against the usual floo network. This is of course highly illegal, and therefore it is not something you should discuss with anyone you haven't seen use the fireplace with your own eyes." Dumbledore finished while looking pointedly at Harry.

"Really professor? That sounds great, but won't it prove an inconvenience to you that your own fireplace have been disconnected? And what would happen if the Ministry found out? Fudge would be furious!"

"Well to tell you the truth Harry, I'm beginning to loose the last of my faith in Fudge and his ministry, and I had already had my fireplace disconnected for security reasons. In fact all of the fireplaces at Hogwarts besides mine have been sealed against any magical use. We are working on finding alternate means of fast communication between the professors, but that is not something for you to worry about. I guess you are as anxious to meet the twins as I am, so without further ado, I think I will get them." Dumbledore rose from his chair and in one long step reached the fireplace. He reached into one of his inner pockets, and pulled out a small pouch, apparently containing floo-powder. He picked up a small amount between his thumb and his index finger and threw it into the fire where the flames turned a bright green, and called out: "Minevera would you, Remus, the Aurors and the Weasley twins please join us in Harry's new Trunk!" Not a second later the flames turned back to their normal state only to flash bright green 7 times in rapid succession.

Out of the flames stepped McGonnagal, Lupin, Tonks, Kingsley Schakelbolt, Alastor Moody and Fred and George Weasley. It was obvious to Harry that the twins hadn't told anyone about the alterations they had had made to the original design of the trunk when he watched the faces of the arriving people, and heard the "oohh's" and "ahh's" as they looked around the living room.

Dumbledore cleared his throat and beckoned everyone to take a seat around the fireplace in the comfortable chairs and the sofa. When everyone had settled more or less down Dumbledore turned to the twins and eyed them suspiciously. "Would you two kindly explain what made you think that it was necessary to change the plans for Harry's presents we already had decided on?"

All the people in the room heard the very pronounced note of amusement in Dumbledore's voice, and turned to the twins. Fred and George stood up from the chairs they were sitting in, with wide grins on their faces.

Fred started speaking first. "Well as all of you know, we recently opened our own joke shop, and some of you know that it has been doing great so far. And most of you also know that we had no way of coming up with the kind of money required to start this up on our own." At this point there were a general murmur of agreement, and Fred paused only to have George take over the scene.

"What most of you don't know however is that at the end of the Tri Wizard Tournament, Harry offered us all of his winnings to start up our joke shop. And as he is our sole sponsor, we have decided to make him a legitimate partner in Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes." George finished, and complete silence fell over the room for a few seconds while the people pondered over this new information, and than an excited buzz erupted.

Over the noise Fred raised his voice and spoke. "Harry, we really do want you as a partner, and consider our little contribution to your present the first payment of your 1/3 of the earnings from the shop. We cannot take all the credit for this of course. I personally don't know any wizard capable of making something like this inside a trunk." While Fred spoke the voices died down and everyone had their attention back on the twins.

George picked up where Fred left off. "Well maybe you could, Albus, but we knew you would never agree. So we enlisted the help of some of Harry's good, what shall we say, friends to help us? Dobby and Winky, would you join us please?"

Immediately two very shy looking house elves appeared next to George, and literally cringed at all the scrutinising looks the people in the room cast at them.

Later that night, Harry lay in his grand bed in his new "apartment" thinking about how the rest of the evening had transpired.

_When Dobby and Winky had arrived, they had been very nervous that they had done something wrong by helping the twins, but everyone had assured them that they had done a wonderful job and that if anyone had done anything wrong, which nobody though anyone had, it would be Fred and George. Everyone had wondered about where they had gotten all the suits of armour and the weapons, and when Dobby had started explaining, Dumbledore had asked him to stop with a sad expression in his eyes. At first Harry hadn't really thought much about this, he was just too overwhelmed by all the new things happening around him, but when he saw the faces of the others in the room show disbelief that Dumbledore wouldn't let the house elves share this information, he realised that something probably was wrong, and he had instantaneously grown very curious about the subject. Dumbledore had dismissed the two house elves, and told Harry that they would talk about this later, and had asked everyone else to be patient as he needed to speak to Harry first. Then he had suggested that everyone had a tour of the apartment. Harry hadn't been happy at this, he had felt like Dumbledore didn't trust him again, and it had made him angry, but he had held his temper because of all the people being there. _

_When everyone else got up from their seating, Harry had reluctantly followed, but had to his surprise enjoyed the Tour Fred and George gave of the apartment, although he knew most of it already. Fred and George had started by showing them the training room, and had explained how both the floor, walls and the ceiling was spell absorbent, so that any stray spells wouldn't cause any real damage. Fred told Harry with a grin in his eye, that they had added the weight equipment, because they still thought that Harry was a bit scrawny. Harry had laughed as George added that they might could have spared that money, as it seemed that Harry's running was paying of. Harry had told them that he thought it was a brilliant idea, and that he probably would use it as soon as everyone had left._

_Then they had proceeded to look at the rest of the apartment, and when they came to the bedroom, Harry had realised that Fred and George must have had their fingers on that mirror in his closet. He had suddenly grown a bit afraid of being in the trunk. Only the great god of pranks would know what else those two had done to the apartment. He had been snapped out of his thoughts as Fred told them that the books in the bookcase were something else the two house elves had supplied. Harry asked George where they had gotten all those wonderful things, but George had just cast a nervous glance at Dumbledore, and said, I guess you'll know soon enough Harry and I really am sorry. Then he had turned around and walked over to Fred. Harry had decided then and there that Dumbledore wouldn't get to leave until he had told Harry where Dobby and Winky had gotten those things and why he should be sorry?_

_When the tour had finished, Fred and George had said their goodbyes and left trough the fireplace. Everyone was back in the living room, again sitting around the fire. Moody had addressed Harry from his chair and had told him, how he, Tonks and Kingsley were supposed to train him to better be able to defend himself. Harry had had a couple of questions which Moody had answered. Finally Moody had told Harry that it would probably be some time before they started his training. Harry had started to interject, but Moody had cut him off, and said that Dumbledore would probably explain it when they had left, but that he couldn't understand why they should wait, and why he wasn't allowed to know why. Tonks and Kingsley seemed to agree on this point but before any of them had time to speak, Dumbledore had thanked them for their time and sent them of._

Harry smiled slightly in his bed as he remembered how Moody had mumbled something not very nice about men with long white beards when he stepped into the fireplace. Then his face fell and tears started rolling silently down his checks as he remembered the next part of the evening. He could remember every single word that had been said, and the multitude of feelings that had rushed over him. Pain, sorrow, bewilderment, mourning, and finally happiness for the glimpse of a new future that had presented itself to him.

_Dumbledore turned to Harry. "Now, Harry I'm sorry to say that we have some unpleasant business to attend to. Sirius left a letter for you in my care to give you if anything was to happen to him. It's sealed so that only you can open it. When you have read it, we'll proceed to discuss his will." Dumbledore handed Harry a thin envelope, and sat back in his chair with a sad look in his eyes. Harry thought he looked very old. _

_He opened Sirius letter and read the single piece of parchment inside._

_**Dear Harry,**_

_**If you are reading this I must be dead. It hurts my very soul thinking that I might leave you before time, but I'm certain that I died fighting for something I believe in – most probably you. I don't want you to feel sad, I want you to be the happy young man you were always meant to be. I want you to remember me, but you should not mourn too long. I'm in a better place now, I'm sure of that much. And if I'm not much mistaken your mom and dad want me to send you their love. You should know that they would be truly proud of you! As I always was. I want to apologise to you for not being able to take care of you for all those years, as I had promised Lilly and James I would – James will have my hide when I meet him. Hopefully Lilly will understand that the only thing that kept me going trough Azkaban was the thought of getting out to you, and the revenge on Peter. On that note Harry, I don't want you to hate Peter even though you surely deserve the right to. I'm sorry I couldn't rid the world of him before I left you, and now it's probably up to you to do my job. When that time comes I want you to show him mercy Harry! If you don't you'll be no better than Voldy, and that is the only thing you could do to ever disappoint me. **_

**_I don't want to leave you without any family left besides the Dursleys, so in my will I have named Remus to be your new guardian. I know he loves you just as much as I do and I know James and Lilly wouldn't have wanted it any other way. The Marauder's stick together. _**

**_I'm leaving you everything I own including my house and all the possessions in the Black family vault. All this is explained more thoroughly in my will, all I ask of you is that you let the Order use the house as much as they want to and that you take good care of Remus. I know he's a stubborn old git, but you'll just have to force him to accept that it's my wish that you two take care of each other. You two are all the family I have left. _**

_**Please remember that I love you, and that I'll always be with you in your heart, and that I have faith in you. I know you'll help Dumbledore rid the world of all this evil Voldemort has brought upon us. **_

_**Your godfather,**_

_**Sirius.**_

_Harry was in tears sitting in the biggest chair, and Dumbledore and Remus watched as he visibly trembled as he read the letter from Sirius. Neither of them had any idea what the letter said, but they could tell it meant a lot to Harry._

_When Harry finally finished reading the letter he swore to himself to himself on his parents' grave that he wouldn't let them and Sirius down. He would take down Voldemort if it was the last thing he would ever do. He stretched out a shaking hand and handed the letter to Remus. When he let go of it, he realised how bad a state he was in, and decide that quiet mourning was what Sirius had wanted, and calmed himself. His heart still wept, but the tears stilled and he stopped shaking. He didn't want to look at Remus and Dumbledore so he just looked into the flames in the fireplace and imagined them eating away Voldemort._

_Soon he realised someone was crying, and he turned to see Remus and Dumbledore sitting next to each other reading the letter, Dumbledore with a single tear on his cheek and with a grave expression on his face, and Remus crying freely his face showing nothing but sorrow and hurt. It made Harry sad to see Remus hurting, and even though he didn't know him as well as he wanted, he stood up and walked over to Remus and put a hand on his shoulder. A moment after Harry placed his hand, Remus finished reading and dropped the letter, and stood up and gripped Harry into a soft hug. They stood like that for a few moments just sharing each others sorrow, before Remus finally pulled away and spoke. "I'm honoured Sirius would make me your guardian Harry, and I know I could never fill his place, but I will try to be the best family I can be. Harry just nodded appreciatively at Remus and gave him a quick hug before sitting down again. _

_Dumbledore put a hand on Remus shoulder as he too sat down, and started explaining that Sirius' will basically said the same as Harry's letter, namely that Harry inherited everything Sirius owned, and that Remus was named his guardian. The only thing Harry needed to do to make it all official, was to sign a piece of parchment Dumbledore pulled out from inside his robes. Dumbledore explained that all the different paintings, suits of armour and books came from the black family vault at Gringotts. _

_All the time McGonnagal had remained silent, but now she cleared her throat rather loudly to catch everyone's attention. "I'm sorry to disturb Albus, but I really am quite bust, and I wonder if we could get on with business?" she asked in a polite voice. _

"_Yes of course, Minevera. I'm sorry I almost forgot. Harry, Professor McGonnagal has been kind enough to do some research for me. I originally didn't intend to let Remus know about this, but since he is your legal guardian by now, I guess he needs to know. Would you please explain to him what you intend to do this year?" Dumbledore said with a small twinkle in his eyes. _

_Harry explained to Remus how he wanted to go back to school as someone else, and why. Remus didn't look as though he appreciated this idea and he told Harry so, but he added that this was Harry's decision, and he would support him no matter what. He also told Harry that he was worried that Ron and Hermione might figure it out. At this point Dumbledore interrupted them, and said that that was something Harry and him self would discuss later on when school drew closer. Then he told Harry that McGonnagal had found a very old spell that would enable the user to change his appearance at will. _

_McGonnagel started speaking at this point. "What's the point Dumbledore? You know as well as I do that this spell is extremely difficult. I Doubt that even someone as skilled as young Mr. Potter here could pull it of. And he would need to focus on the spell all the time, which would mean that he would have to hold his wand in his hand all the time. To top it of he would have his learning capabilities severely hampered because of the concentration needed to maintain the spell."_

"_You know I know this Minevera and now Harry knows it too. Now if you would please hand Harry the instruction and training papers you have written. I'm sure Harry will read it trough and let us know if he can think of any way to make this work. But for now I think you have done your duty wonderfully, and I know how busy you are. Good evening Minevera." All the time while speaking Dumbledore held Harry's gaze in his own. Harry almost immediately remembered that no one was supposed to know about his abilities at wandless magic, but he was surprised that this apparently applied to McGonnagal and Remus too. Professor McGonnagal said goodbye to the three of them, and stepped into the fireplace, calling out "Hogwarts"._

"_Now, Harry there's only one thing left on our agenda for the night. I would like you to continue with your Occlumency lessons, but since Professor Snape doesn't know about any of this, and since I prefer to keep it that way, just for safety, you'll require a new teacher. I have come to understand that your lack of progress in this field, might be due to the lack of, shall we say, understanding between Professor Snape and you. And since I think it's of the highest importance that you master this art before you leave the protection of this house, I myself will be teaching you."_

_Harry wasn't sure he liked the idea of continuing with the tedious study of how to keep someone from poking trough your mind, but he realised that it was necessary to keep his friends safe. "That sounds great Professor, but aren't you very busy with The Order?"_

"_Yes Harry, I'm afraid I am, and that's why we'll have a flexible training schedule. I would like it if you were available here in your trunk every day at 9am and at 4pm. I can't guarantee I'll be able to come here every time, or even everyday, but I'll do my utmost to give you as much as my time as possible until you master Occlumency. The times when I won't be able to get here, I want you to practise all the same. I brought you a couple of books that hopefully will help you understand Occlumency better, and I think you should read them as soon as possible. I'll not be back tomorrow, but I want you to use the day for studying the first of the books thoroughly, so that we can start working effectively the day after tomorrow. If you find you finish early, don't start on the next book before we have had our first lesson, instead I believe you are anxious to get on with your **other** practise."_

_Harry nodded and took the two books Dumbledore was holding out towards him. _

_Remus sad in his chair with a confused look on his face, and looked as though he was just about to ask what this other training was, when Dumbledore spoke._

"_I know you are curious Remus, but trust me when I say that its better that this is kept a secret. If everything goes as planned, you'll know about this by the first of September, I promise you that." Dumbledore said with a voice that said that this was not something that was up for discussion. _

"_But I'm his guardian now, don't I **need** to know?" Remus asked almost pleadingly._

"_I'm afraid there may come a point where you might need to know at least some of it, but that time is certainly not now. That goes for you too Harry. I know you are probably happy that Remus is now your legal guardian, but you are under no circumstances to tell him about this. I trust you understand why?"_

_Although Harry was reluctant to admit it, he did understand that it was vital that no one knew about his newfound abilities. If they did there was a chance that the information would get back to Voldemort, and that was something they couldn't afford, so he sat quietly with his head down for a moment before he said "Yes Professor I understand. I'm sorry Remus, but it really is for the best. I would very much like to have someone to talk to about this, but it would put everyone in greater danger than they already are."_

_Remus smiled sadly at Harry. "If you say so Harry I believe you, and I hope that your efforts aren't futile. I wish you good luck. I might not be able to come around too often because of Order business, but I'll try to drop in every once in a while."_

"_Thanks Remus, I would like that."_

_Then everyone had said goodbye, and Remus had left first trough the fireplace. _

"_That is all the time we have got for tonight Harry, so I would like it if you would please tell me if you have decided to go on with your plan or not?"_

_Just before Dumbledore had stepped into the flames, he had turned around and told Harry not to focus on anything but mastering the spell McGonnagal had found and learning Occlumency. The rest of his abilities there would be plenty of time to focus on when he got to Hogwarts. _

That was the last thought Harry had that night, as he fell asleep with dried out tears on his cheeks.¨


	4. Difficult beginnings and a red cheek

Chapter 4: Difficult beginnings and a red cheek

Thursday Harry didn't wake until it was nearly 11am, but that didn't bother him particularly considering how late it had gotten before he had finally closed his eyes. He was happy to find out that he slept much better in his new apartment, than he did in Dudley's old battered bed. When he had gotten himself ready for the day, he made a point to go down in the kitchen for the Dursleys to notice him, before he headed back up into his room and down into his trunk, where he spent the entire day reading trough all the material McGonnagal had brought, and the first of the books on Occlumency:

_Occlumency for beginners,_

_NOT for dummies._

The spell that his professor had discovered was extremely complex to perform, way beyond even seventh year at Hogwarts, but once it had been cast it didn't require _anything_ but a good deal of concentration, and noted Harry amused to himself, the need to hold your wand at all times. He didn't try to perform the spell, as he decided he wanted to do some more intensive study before he would be able to master it.

When he had finished skimming trough the Occlumency book, he had an overwhelming feeling of hatred against Snape. It was clear now, that the greasy git hadn't even tried teaching him how to do this properly. The book explained that the most important thing needed to be able to do Occlumency was the ability to empty the mind of all thoughts and more importantly feelings. Harry knew that already, but he was surprised to find that there were numerous ways of achieving this, most of which figured around meditation. When the which or wizard finally succeeded in clearing his or her mind sufficiently he or she would need to build a fortress around their thoughts and feelings, or more precisely the door behind which they had hid them.

When Harry went to bed that night his mind was spinning with all the information he had forced into it, and he had a strong feeling that he wouldn't be able to remember the slightest thing in the morning. He decided that it was best to hope that Dumbledore wouldn't arrive too early.

Harry only just got ready for 9am the next morning and to his great disappointment Dumbledore stepped out of the fireplace at that exact time.

Dumbledore smiled happily at Harry as he spoke. "Good morning Mr. Potter. I assume you have had a good nights sleep and are well prepared as I asked?"

Harry yawned, and sent the old headmaster an apologetic look. "Yes Sir."

"Before we begin Harry there is something else we need to discuss. You remember how Winky was very…. sad….. when she came to Hogwarts? At the time we all assumed that it was because she thought she had betrayed her master, but I fear new evidence has come to light that suggest that there may be more to this then we thought at first. You see Harry, although Winky thankfully isn't drinking anymore, she is still extremely sad, but the thing that worries me the most, is that Dobby seems to be loosing his cheerfulness too. At times he even seems depressed. It has also come to my attention, that even though they wont admit it, their powers are weakening too, and I must say I'm very surprised that they managed to make all this for you" Dumbledore said as he gestured around the room, the smile vanished from his face. "I have done some research, and the only explanation I can find, is that their magic and happiness is simply tied to their close bond with the wizarding family they serve, and if this is true, then the obvious solution to this problem is, that they start to serve a family once again."

Harry contemplated about all this for a couple of moments before he spoke with a worried note evident in his voice. "I see, Sir. It kind of makes sense when you think about it. I just wish I had a way of helping them!"

Harry positively jumped when he heard Dobby's squeaky voice from behind him. "But Harry Potter Sir, _can_ help Dobby and Winky. Harry Potter Sir is such a great wizard and Dobby and Winky would be honoured to serve him."

Dumbledore managed in the last second to turn a chuckle into a cough, he just couldn't help himself. Harry's perplexed expression was priceless.

"Dobby, Winky – what are you two doing here? I mean I'm happy to see you just as always, and I didn't get the chance to thank you for all the work you've done here. And I fell honoured that you would want to serve me, but it's not like I need it. This is all I got and I can easily manage this on my own."

Dumbledore spoke immediately, as he could see that Dobby was about to start crying and Winky were already showing a small flow of tears down her cheeks. "Well Harry, if you think about it you actually _do _have a need for some help. As you are now the master of the old Black family home, it is your duty to make sure the house is kept to a standard you see fit. And when you get back to school I doubt that you'll have enough time to keep your new "apartment" clean and in order."

Harry could see the tears in Winky's eyes, and he was pretty sure that Dobby was about to start crying too, and to top it up he was sure that he heard a hint of pleading (pleading is too strong a word, but I can't seem to find something else that fits… sorry) in Dumbledore's voice and he knew that Dumbledore was right. He wanted to be a good host to the order and whoever wanted to stay at Grimmauld place, even though he still didn't want to set foot there. All in all it seemed like a good solution to everyone, and Harry wondered if the two house elves could make some changes in the old Black house so that it would actually be an enjoyable place to live.

Without further holding the tension in the room, Harry grabbed Dobby and Winky in a fierce hug and smiled brightly at them. "Of course I would be honoured to have you live with me, and serve me. Although before I agree, I need a few seconds to think, because I have a bunch of rules racing trough my head, that I want to run by you first." Harry thought for a few seconds before continuing. "First of all, and most importantly: If you want to serve me, I don't want you to ever punish your self, if I haven't specifically ordered you to do so. Secondly: Anything you hear people talking about either here or in Grimmauld Place you cannot tell anyone else about. When you work in Grimmauld Place you'll do as Professor Dumbledore, Professor McGonnagal and Remus Lupin instructs you. Further more you must always be polite to people who are my guests whether you like them or not, and finally I would like you to wear clothes if you want to. You can still work for me if you do want to wear clothes, and that way you can always feel free to come to me and tell me that you want to leave my service, although I hope you'll stay with me.

Dobby and Winky were now smiling up to both ears – which are actually some _very_ wide smiles.

"What can Dobby and Winky do for Master Harry Potter, Sir?" Dobby squealed delighted

"Well Dobby. Now that you say it, you remind me I have one more rule for you to abide to. I don't want either of you to call me anything but Harry. This goes for everyone else you speak to too – you have to address them as they want you to. As for the first thing I want you to do, I have 2 very important jobs for you, but I only want you to start on them if you are certain that you are up for it. I can imagine that it'll be a bit strenuous for you."

This time it was Winky's turn to speak up, and Harry was amazed by the way she suddenly seemed as happy as Dobby had always been. "What can we do for you, Master Har…….. Harry? Anything you want." Winky flushed brightly as she addressed Harry, she clearly wasn't used to speak to anyone as their equal.

"Well, now that you are my family, I would think that you would need a place to live, so I would like for you to ad a room each to the apartment, that will be your own, and I would like you both to choose a room at Grimmauld Place too. And I want you to furnish and decorate them as you see fit. When you are finished doing that, and have enjoyed your new rooms for a bit, I would like you to redecorate the entire of Grimmauld place in the same style you have used here in the apartment. Do you think that would be possible?" Harry asked, already a little worried that he may be asking too much of the two small creatures.

Dobby and Winky looked at each other for only the slightest of moments, before they turned to Harry and eagerly nodded their heads. It was Dobby who spoke for the both of them. "We will do the best we can Harry, but we are sorry to say it will take us a couple of days to ad the rooms to the apartment. We need to have a little rest to regain our powers, if you'll allow it, before we can start. When we are done with adding the rooms to the apartment we will do our best to redecorate your other house. It'll be our honour!" Dobby stopped for a second and looked very deep in thought before he added. "But how will we know that you are pleased with us, if you won't come and see how we have changed everything?" Dobby finished, worry evident in his eyes. It seemed the little elves were worried that they weren't going to do their job to their new master's satisfaction.

On a rare note of actually being in tune with other people's emotions, Harry recognised the doubt of his own abilities in Dobby's eyes, and he decided that if they were really going _to serve_ him, the least he could do was treat them as part of a family. So he got down on one knee, and took hold of Dobby and Winky's hands and looked them straight in their huge eyes. "No matter what I ask you to do, I'll never be disappointed in you, if you do the job to the best of your abilities. And judging by what you have done with this apartment, I believe I'll be truly impressed when I hear what people have to say about the house when you are done with it. I maybe even come and see it for myself, when my grief have subsided a bit, but for the moment, I don't even want to think about that place."

After giving Dobby and Winky each a fierce hug once more, Harry sent them of to give him and the old headmaster some time alone. They had already used a lot of the time Dumbledore had been able to take out of his busy schedule, and the rest of the time they discussed what Harry had studied so far, and how he were going to continue his studies. Dumbledore was satisfied with Harry's progress, and he gave him a few pointers on which meditation techniques to start out with and how to make them work.

When Dumbledore had finally left around 11am, Harry was getting hungry and he went in to the kitchen to see if he could manage a decent lunch for him self. To his surprise Winky and Dobby were already there preparing lunch, and Harry couldn't help but grin widely as he saw the enormous amounts of food stacked around the kitchen. He was sure there was enough food to feed a small army there.

The two house elves turned around and beamed at him as he entered the kitchen, and positively squealed with delight as they saw his big eyes as he stared at all the food they had prepared. "Why don't you just go sit down living room Harry, then we will bring you your food in a couple of minutes" Winky stated with a cheerful smile smeared across her face.

Harry just stood there a minute and wondered how it was that he had suddenly become so lucky to have not one, but two house elves… After a few seconds thought it occurred to him that maybe Dumbledore had his fingers in on this too. The old man had probably figured that since Harry had cut himself off from his friends, he needed someone else to keep him company at least some of the time. After Harry silently had raged about how that old fool persistently meddled in his affairs for a couple of milliseconds, he realised that he wasn't angry at all, but that he as actually grateful that he knew Dumbledore and that he kept an eye out for him. Granted he had made some mistakes in the last 16 years, quite a lot actually, but Harry had come to realise that Dumbledore only did what he thought was best.

Harry watched the two house elves working for a few seconds and decided that if they should live together then they should at least live like any normal family would, and so he asked them if they wanted to join him for lunch.

Dobby and Winky looked shocked beyond belief at his suggestion and Harry had to reassure them for several minutes before they finally believed that he wasn't taunting him and that he was in fact serious. Winky looked shy when Dobby stuttering started to explain to Harry that the things they ate wasn't exactly the same as Harry, and that they would rather not eat in front of him, as they thought that it was very embarrassing. Harry could see that the thought bothered them very much, and he didn't want to force them to do anything, let alone something that was so insignificant. He thought that he would let the issue drop for now, but when they had become more secure with him, he still thought that he should suggest that they at least would come and sit with him while he ate, so they could talk just like a real family.

After lunch Harry was going to work on the spell that Professor McGonagall had brought for him. Strangely enough it didn't have a name, and Harry wondered if it was so old and unknown that its name had actually been forgotten. As he started studying the spell once more, he found that he wasn't quite capable of concentrating like he felt he should. He kept working for almost 15 minutes and was growing steadily more aggravated that he couldn't seem to focus on the task at hand. After 20 minutes, he was just about ready to explode, when he heard a small cough behind him.

When he turned around, he could see Winky literally cringe at the expression on his face. Still he couldn't help but be annoyed that she disturbed him, when he clearly wasn't capable of concentrating in the first place.

Winky didn't like the way Harry was looking, and she thought that it was her duty to see if she could help her new master. "Winky is very sorry to disturb Master Harry, but Winky though that maybe she could help Master with something? Can Winky do something to ease Masters work?"

Harry sighed and looked down when he spoke. "I told you not to call me Master Winky. And no I'm afraid there isn't anything you can do to help me, unless you know some spell to make me able to concentrate better?" Harry's voice spoke volumes about how likely he found it that Winky could actually help him.

When Winky spoke, he looked up again only to see the small house elf smiling tentatively at him. "No Mas… Harry. Winky does not know any spell of that kind. But Winky thinks she can help Harry help himself, that is if Harry wants help from a simple house elf?"

"Of course I want your help Winky, why wouldn't I? And what is it you mean by you think you can help me help myself?" Harry had the smallest of glimpses of hope in his eyes, but he still looked very _down_.

Suddenly Winky didn't seem too keen on telling Harry what it was that she thought would help, she actually stuttered quite a lot as she spoke. "Well you see Harry. Winky didn't want to spy, but she kind of overheard Harry speaking with Master Albus Dumbledore. Didn't master Dumbledore and Harry talk about using…. now what was that strange word? Medutanon? To help Harry concentrate on how to keep his mind closed. Winky doesn't understand all this, but she thought that maybe Harry could use this medutanon to concentrate on his studies? Winky wasn't bad, was she?"

As Winky finished she was almost shaking like a rather small apple tree in a brewing storm and she was studying her feet very carefully. As such she didn't see Harry's eyes lighting up like a Christmas tree while she spoke, and she was most certainly surprised when Harry literally flung him self at her and pulled her into a tight embrace.

"NO Winky, you haven't done anything wrong. Actually I'm very proud of you. It's just a brilliant idea! Thank you so much. And by the way the word is _meditation_. Oh you are just great! I'll try that right away. By the way Winky, are there any way I can make the light in here a bit dimmer? I like it as it is, but it's hard for me to concentrate on the meditation with the light this bright."

"Winky is happy to help Harry. I will make the light dimmer for you now, and when you need to do it later yourself, I'm sure that you can do it if you want to. You just have to believe in yourself Harry." Winky beamed at him, snapped her fingers and disappeared just as the lights in the living room dimmed to a very comfy setting.

Harry wondered what Winky meant that he should just believe in himself, but banished the though from his mind as he sat down in his favourite chair and closed his eyes. He focused on nothing at all, and at the same time tried to force all of his thoughts, feelings and emotions into a small room in the back of his mind. It took him a great deal of effort, but finally he closed the door to the small room. He could feel his heartbeat slowing as he finally truly relaxed for the first time in ages.

After just sitting and relaxing for an, to Harry, indefinable amount of time, he started rummaging trough his own now empty mind to make sure he had gotten all of his thoughts and emotions locked away. After searching some of the furthest reaches of his mind and collecting some stray memories Harry returned to the door, and chuckled as he really watched it for the first time. It didn't look anything like the fortress he had read it should look like, but more like a thin plywood door bulging out on the middle. Harry slowly moved towards the door, while thinking that even though he still far from sported an impenetrable mind, he had at least made some progress. When he reached the door he grabbed the handle and pulled open the door, fully intending to just throw in the last memories and then lock it up again, only he must have somehow miscalculated something.

As soon as the lock clicked open and he pressed the handle down, the door flew open violently, and Harry was thrown backwards and out of his own mind by the rushing of all his memories, thoughts and feelings retuning to their original places. Harry felt himself _land_ in his own body, heart beating like an express train, and a stream of profanities that he didn't even realise he knew streamed from his lips.

Immediately two loud cracks rang trough the apartment as Dobby and Winky appeared back to back, with a bright blueish glow coming from their hands. They quickly surveyed the entire room and then faced Harry. When they a couple of seconds later were satisfied that he was safe and unharmed, they dropped their stances, excused them self for startling him, and disappeared as fast as they had appeared in the first place.

Harry had forgotten everything about what had happened just seconds ago, the only thing he could think of, was the sight of two positively scary looking house elves. Their usual sweet and kind faces were all screwed up, and their mouths had been half open in what appeared to be a snarl. And when Harry thought really hard about it, he was certain that he had seen pointed teeth… Pointed teeth? Since when did house elves have pointed teeth? Harry was quite sure that they didn't and he was truly happy that they were obviously on his side. He sure as hell didn't want to be on the receiving end of what they seamed to be ready to release on anyone threatening him.

When Harry had just sat there for a couple of minutes a million thoughts rummaging trough his head, he remembered Winky's advice to him earlier and he closed his eyes once more and tried to relax. Soon he was once again feeling his heartbeat slow, but this time he didn't empty his mind completely. Instead he focused on removing everything but all the knowledge he had gathered trough the years at Hogwarts. When he was finally feeling relaxed and ready, he opened his eyes and started reading trough all the information about the spell.

Harry found it loads easier to study like this, he actually felt like he was making tremendous progress when Winky disturbed him again. He hadn't studied for more than half an hour, but still here were Winky telling him that dinner was ready. Harry was quite confused, and Winky seemed to sense this right away, as she immediately explained to him that he had been meditating for hours in his first try, and for a bit over an hour in his second one.

Harry was dumbfounded. Had he really spent that much time? It just didn't seem real. He decided that he must need a lot more practise if he was to be able to clear his mind before he went to bed each evening. But that would have to wait. First things first, and Harry found that he was quite hungry, so he gladly allowed Winky and Dobby to set the table and serve his food. He felt kind of strange having all this attention put on him in such a positive way. He was used to all the attention of the students at Hogwarts, but this was so much different. Kind of enjoyable when he thought about it. He just wished that his friends could join him.

As soon as the thought entered his mind, his face fell. Dobby and Winky apparently noted, because in an instant, Dobby had brought a bit flustered Hedwig down in the trunk. In her beak she had no less then what appeared to be four letters. Harry sighed as she landed on his shoulder and dropped the four roles of parchment on his still empty plate.

Harry picked her down from his shoulder, and gently stroked her while she sat on his arm. Hedwig studied him with a very demanding look in her eyes, and Harry sighed once again.

"You know I can't read them honey. I really miss them, but you know that I can't put them in any more danger than they are already in. You need to take the letters back to them. But before you go, why don't you keep me company while I eat? I'm kind of lonely, and I don't think Dobby and Winky are ready to join me for dinner yet."

Harry looked down on his precious friend and stroked her gently and then sat her down on the table.

"Why don't you pick some food for yourself? Dobby and Winky have once again outdone them selves, and there is just too much food here for me to eat. I'll get a glass for you."

Harry decided that he just as well could practise some wand less magic while he was at it, and called out _accio glass_ to summon a glass from the kitchen. Apparently it was more difficult doing the spell without a wand, because although the glass did come flying into the living room from the kitchen, it missed Harry's outstretched hand by almost half a meter, and banged into the wall on the other side of the room and shattered.

Harry was busy swearing, and banging his hands on the table so poor Hedwig hooted and flew to his shoulder and napped him rather hard in his ear. Because of all this, Harry didn't notice that his two faithful house elves instantly appeared behind him, surveyed the scene, only to disappear instantly again. A couple of seconds later Dobby came in trough the kitchen door and started cleaning the mess of the broken glass. Not that it was much of a task. In fact he merely waved his hand above the shattered pieces which assembled themselves quite nicely, and then picked up the glass and went to put it on the table.

Harry thanked Dobby, and absentmindedly continued soothing a startled Hedwig. When Dobby had nearly reached the door to the kitchen, Harry called him back.

"Dobby do you think when you are done with the other chores I've asked of you, that you could make some kind of entrance for Hedwig? I would like it if she could get in here without either of us carrying her."

"Dobby doesn't know if it can be done Harry, but Dobby will try and look into it."

Harry finished his dinner with Hedwig by his side, and decided that he had better get some fresh air. He got up and changed into his running outfit, while he left Hedwig at the table. When he returned he picked her and the letters up, and carried his beloved owl up into his aunt and uncles house. As soon as Harry sat foot outside of the trunk he stopped dead in his tracks. It appeared that Dobby and Winky had decided that his old room needed a bit of cleaning, and they had done a remarkable job. This would make aunt Petunia rather proud Harry thought absentmindedly while he opened the window and sent Hedwig of with the letters from his friends.

Harry watched his only friend at the moment, soar high towards the sky, and felt a little pang of pain as she disappeared against the night sky, becoming one with the stars. Harry trudged down the stairs and hurried out of the front door. He had no intention of having a run in with his relatives. Safely outside he did a few stretches, before he slowly started jogging down the street to get his muscles warm. After jogging for 5 minutes he picked up the pace, and soon he was sweating rather heavily in the warm summer night. When he had run for 25 minutes he turned down a couple of roads, and started running back parallel to the road he had taken on the way out.

Harry was running in his own thoughts when something suddenly jumped out from a rose bush and stood dead still in front of him. He scrambled to a halt, as the sight of the figure in front of him reached his mind, which promptly responded by making his eyes water. There in front of him stood padfoot.

At least it might as well have been. A rather scruffy looking black dog, with deep lonely eyes. It looked up at Harry with almost pleading eyes, but all Harry could do was stare at it with tears streaming down his cheeks. Suddenly the weight of all the memories that had started running trough his mind became too much, and Harry bolted down the street, desperately trying to get away from the haunting memories of his godfather. He sprinted down one street, then one more without even noticing where he was going, the tears in his eyes making everything blurry beyond recognition.

A couple of roads further, he found himself incapable of taking as much as one more step. He had stopped in the middle of the road, and when his mind kicked back into gear a second later, it was with the realisation, that the two lights approaching him rather fast was headlights. He felt as if nailed to the ground. There was no way he was going to make it out of the way in time, and the car was certainly going fast enough to kill him instantly… Maybe it wouldn't be so bad. He would get to see Sirius again. And his mom and dad too. Harry could hear the brakes and tires screeching for grip, but it was a matter of seconds before it would all be over.

Suddenly time seemed to slow down, and Harry watched in horror, as he could see someone running towards him hidden under an invisibility cloak. Just before time itself seemed to come to a complete stop Harry could see that the person under the cloak had jumped, and was going to try and push Harry out of the speeding cars way. It was also painstakingly obvious that his attempted rescuer wasn't going too succeed. The only thing the person would accomplish was getting him or her self killed too.

When Harry thought about it later, he didn't know if he had in fact slowed time, if someone else had, or if maybe his mind had suddenly jumped into overdrive, but it was a matter of fact, that a great deal of thoughts ran trough his mind during this time. Harry wondered who were under the cloak, and why they would willingly die to save him. He also wondered if he should just pretend that he hadn't seen this person, and let faith have its will, and have him done for. Well he couldn't let that happen. He didn't want to add one more to the list of people he had brought death upon. First his parents, then that poor ministry employee, then Cedric and Sirius of course. He was sure he wouldn't be able to live with him self, if he allowed one more person to die on his account.

Suddenly time sprang into action again, and Harry without thinking much about it, and completely ignoring the fact that it was supposedly impossible, wandlessly used Wingardium Leviosa to lift him self 6 feet into the air, and out of harms way, and while he couldn't stop the person hurdling trough the air to save him, he boosted their altitude, so that the car sped underneath both of them.

This had a rather undesirable side effect though. While the car righted it self and drove on as if nothing had happened at all, Harry could see the invisibility cloak and its wearer fly straight towards a lamp post. Milliseconds later Harry heard something that sounded eerily like skull against metal. Harry was in complete shock. First he had saved the person from being hit by the car, only to have him slam head first into a solid metal object, which in the best case, wasn't a very good thing. How come everything always went wrong for him? It wasn't fair! Harry watched the scene, as his two faithful house elves appeared below him, looking absolutely livid, only to have their expressions changed to ones of disbelief, as they discovered Harry floating 6 feet above their heads sitting in something like a lotus position.

As soon as Winky let out a small scream, Harry apparently lost his concentration, and abruptly dropped to the ground. "Is Harry all right?" dobby squealed, and ran to Harry's side. Harry, with only a few bruises and a sore bum to show for it, got up and assured the two frightened house elves that he was okay. When the house elves a minute later had backed just a few inches away, Harry pushed them apart, and went over to the lightning pole to check up on the person that had been guarding and trying to save him. He felt his feet bump into something soft lying on the ground, but the person under the cloak clearly wasn't conscious, as he or she didn't make a sound. Harry carefully searched for the hem of the cloak, and when he had found it he gently started pulling the cloak of.

The face that met him was covered in blood, and Harry didn't even recognise it until he had wiped a lot of blood away with his own sleeve. As soon as he recognised who had been trying to rescue him, he could feel tears pressing on in the corners of his eyes.

"No!" he thought. He couldn't let this happen. He quickly pulled the cloak completely of the unconscious figure, and then proceeded to put it on himself. He left the hood down, so Dobby and Winky could still see him. "Dobby I want you to take him directly to St. Mungos. Don't tell them what really happened to him, just tell him that he fell down. Winky you will take me along under the cloak. When we are safely there, you will go to headquarters and tell the order to go to the hospital to see him. Do you both understand?"

"We understand Harry Potter Sir, but we can't let….."

"Don't argue with me now. We don't have time. This is how it's going to be. Now let's get going!"

Dobby and Winky shot each other a concerned glance, and the Dobby grabbed hold of the unconscious figure and disappeared with a soft pop. Winky got under the cloak with Harry, grabbed a hold of his leg, and then Harry felt a strange sensation flowing trough his body as they were swept away to the wizading hospital in London.

Not more than a split second later they arrived, and Harry had to restrain himself physically to not let out a small yelp. This was so much better than travelling by portkey. He wondered if it felt the same way to apparate, and decided that if it did, then he would definitely cherish the day he could travel like that.

Harry didn't have too much time to think about this though, as he immediately had to jump out of the way of medi-witch hovering a seemingly lifeless body by her side. He only just managed to keep himself and Winky hidden under the cloak. He quickly manoeuvred himself and the small house elf over to one of the walls, where they were mostly safe from all the people bustling about the arrivals area.

Harry bent down and whispered in Winky's ear: "Now go and get someone from the order. But don't tell them I'm here. If they ask just tell them that I told you not to say anything else than that Dobby and you are watching me, ok?" Winky nodded her head, but Harry could see that she wasn't pleased about the prospect of not telling someone the entire truth. Harry just gave his friend a small smile, and he watched as Winky disappeared in front of his eyes, with a single snap of her fingers.

As soon as Winky was gone Harry looked around in the rather large and crowded room, and soon spotted Dobby walking down a corridor after 2 medi-wizards anxiously looking over his shoulder from time to time. What Dobby couldn't see was that Harry was already hurrying to catch up with him, and was actually only a few steps behind him when the two wizards turned into a room on the right hand side of the corridor. Dobby followed them inside, but he kept the door open just long enough for Harry to slip inside undetected.

From the corner where he was standing, the only thing he could really see was a lock of red, blood stained hair. Harry was happy to listen to the talk of the two wizards as they examined the body lying in the hospital bed, because it quickly became obvious that he wouldn't have another life on his hands.

Harry slowly rested himself against the wall and slowly slid down it until he sat crumbled up in a corner of the all white hospital room. Only a few minutes later the door to the ward opened and in poured half of the order. Remus, McGonagall, Tonks, Shacklebolt, Molly Weasley, the twins, Ron and Ginny all looking extremely anxious Harry noted, before he hid his face in his hands. The guilt of all he had brought upon these people hit him hard, and he couldn't help but feel that he didn't deserve all the kindness they had showed him.

All the Weasley 's were standing around the bed, when the rest of the order quickly turned on Winky who had by now joined Dobby on the other side of the ward. It was McGonnagal who spoke first and voiced all of their concerns. "Winky, you told us that you and Dobby were watching Harry. Now _he_ is clearly not here, and both of you are. So would you care to explain where he is, so we can send someone to see to him?" McGonagall's voice was friendly but firm, and there was no doubt that she wanted an answer fast. The answer she got far from pleased her.

"Winky and Dobby are watching Master Harry Potter Sir, Miss McGonagall, but Winky can not tell you where Master is. Master said not to." Winky looked very frightened as she finished the sentence and looked up into the eyes of an absolutely furious witch.

It was painstakingly clear to everyone in the room, that the strict professor was about to blow her top, when a calm voice spoke from the door. "Calm yourself Minevera. I have every confidence in Dobby and Winky, and I can assure you that Harry IS quite safe at the moment."

"But Albus…." McGonnagal started, only to stop speaking as Dumbledore glared at her above his half moon spectacles, the merry twinkle in his eyes only just there. "Not now, Minevera! I see that our friend has finally awoken. Now Mr. Weasley, would you care to explain to us what has happened to you tonight?" Dumbledore's voice was still calm, but the tone in it left no room for argument. Not that it was really necessary as all eyes in the room had already turned to Charlie lying in the bed with a pained expression on his face.

Charlie's eyes suddenly flew wide open, but they clearly didn't focus on anything in the room as he screamed out: "NO Harry! Don't do it!"

Ms. Weasley quickly bent down and soothed Charlie, and soon he was well and aware enough to tell them what had happened during the evening. He started out by telling them about Harry coming out and starting running, and how he followed him with ease, his fitness from being a dragon trainer helping him. Then he explained that Harry had suddenly froze as he came face to face with a black dog, and pain showed on all their faces at the memory of Sirius. Then he explained how Harry had suddenly started sprinting aimlessly down the street and how it seemed like he run with super-human speed. Charlie's voice almost cracked over with emotion as he told them how Harry had just stood there waiting for the speeding car to hit him.

There was an uproar when Charlie finished his little speech. Everyone speed talked on top of each other, and soon everyone were more or less screaming at the top of their longs. No one was shouting at anyone in particular, except maybe at Harry, but since they didn't know he was there it was more out of frustration than anything else.

Harry lifted his head out of his hands for a moment, when he almost could feel a pair of eyes staring at him. Dumbledore looked straight at him and Harry felt as if Dumbledore was warning him about something. He couldn't figure out what it was though, and when Dumbledore turned and faced the screaming order members and Weasley family members, he put his face back in his hand. He couldn't handle this… All these people were shouting at him. He figured they blamed him for Charlie's condition. And they were right too, he kept telling himself in his mind. The only positive thought he could think at the moment, was that he was confirmed in his decision to go back to Hogwarts under cover. He would brake down if one more of his friends were hurt, he just knew it!

Dumbledore apparently didn't appreciate all the screaming, because for the first time Harry could ever remember, he raised his voice. "ENOUGH!" Just that one word. But it was more than sufficient. The room immediately fell completely silent and more than one person thought they had heard thunder in the voice of the old man. When Dumbledore had everyone's attention, which really didn't take long, he looked each of them deep in the eyes and continued, addressing Charlie. "Now Mr. Weasley would you care to explain what happened next to put you in this state, please?"

"No – I want to now something first." He turned his head to Dumbledore. "Is Harry alright? With all of you here, Dad caught up at the ministry and Moody on assignment, then who is watching Harry?" Charlie's voice had started shaking again, and he looked almost as pale as the hospital bedspreads.

"Take it easy Charlie. You really need to rest. Dobby and Winky tell me that Harry is alright and I can assure you that they are trust worthy in this matter. As to who is watching Harry, they themselves are taking care of that too. But please tell us what happened next." Dumbledore's voice was back to its calm self, and his eyes twinkled again, although not as merrily as they used to.

Charlie sighed. "There really isn't much to tell. As I told you he just stood there and waited for the car to hit him. I couldn't let that happen. So I jumped to push him out of the way and let the car hit me instead. That's all I can remember. I'm fairly sure I didn't get to him in time though."

At Charlie's last words Ms. Weasley broke into a fit of sobs. She clearly didn't enjoy the thought of one of her sons sacrificing himself for the sake of someone she considered her 7th son.

Immediately all the Weasley children rushed to their mother's side, and hugged her fiercely. It was Ginny who put a voice to all their emotions. It's all right mum. Charlie's okay. And so is Harry. They are both okay." She continued muttering under her breath, but it seemed nobody heard what she said: "although Harry better be wicked fast with his wand when I get my hands on him!"

Dumbledore looked a bit worried that Charlie couldn't tell them more, but he knew where to get the information he wanted, although he didn't like the though of what Ginny Weasley would do to Harry in a couple of minutes. Dumbledore shot a quick glace to the corner where Harry was still hiding his face in his hands. God he felt old. That boy had gone trough so much. He wished that he could take all the hurt back Harry had experienced, but here he was about to make life even more difficult from him. He sighed. "Well Mr. Weasley I know one person who can tells us all of what happened, so why don't you just relax."

Ginny cut in. "Yes Harry can tell us, the only problem is we don't know where he is."

"I have to disagree with you Ms. Weasley. As Dobby and Winky already told you, they are watching Harry as we speak. As am I. Harry. Would you care to tell us what happened tonight?"

Everyone now stared at Dumbledore like he had finally lost it. Everyone besides Dobby and Winky, who were shooting each other and one of the corners of the room strange glances.

Everyone's eyes turned to the corner of the room when they herd a flutter of a cloak being dropped on the ground. Everyone stood deadly still and watched the suddenly appeared Harry in shock. The first person to move was Ginny, and she strode across the room so fast, that nobody could stop her in time.

SMACK, SMACK. She slapped Harry so hard his cheeks got so red they matched the fire in her hair and her eyes. "That's for not talking to us all summer, and that's for not getting out of the way of that car. Now explain yourself Harry Potter, or Merlin I'll hex you so bad Voldemort will seem like a nice uncle when I'm done with you."

"Ginevera Molly Weasley, Will you stop this instant! You should know better….." Molly started shouting, until she was silenced by Harry's soft, sad voice.

"Dobby, Winky. Will you please take me home? Professor Dumbledore, I'll send Dobby or Winky to Hogwarts or Headquarters, which ever you prefer, and then they can tell you what they saw. I'm certain you can figure the rest out. If not then I guess I'll be seeing you tomorrow." Harry shot a meaningful look at Dumbledore, before he turned to Dobby and Winky, took their outstretched hands, and gave a single nod.


	5. Bed Rest For Beginners

Chapter 5: Bed rest for beginners

The room fell silent as the house elves swept Harry away with a soft pop, to only Dumbledore knows where. Even Dumbledore seemed stunned that Harry had just left the way he did. Suddenly the room exploded with voices for the second time that night.

"Why are Dobby and Winky with Harry?"

"Who does he think he is, just leaving like that?"

"Where exactly is home? He hasn't been in his room for days? And now he suddenly appears there and goes for a run?"

Questions were being shot out like machinegun fire everywhere, and everything was rapidly descending into mayhem. Again it fell to Dumbledore to restore order, and when everyone was finally silent he spoke again.

"Listen up everyone. I know you've got loads of questions, but I'm afraid that I'm not the one to answer them. Harry is. Harry is staying with his uncle and aunt at Privet Drive although you may or may not see him often, I guarantee you that he's there. And therefore I need you to go there immediately, Kingsley, and take over Mr. Weasley's guard duties. As to why Dobby and Winky are staying with Harry, the two elf's couldn't survive not being bound to a family, and Harry has graciously accepted to take them in. This is also a great way for us to offer Harry some more protection, although I'm not sure Harry actually realise how far House elves will go to protect their masters. Now I think we should all leave Mr. Weasley here to get some rest as he will surely need it after tonight's ordeal."

They all looked at each other and muttered complaints, but none of them could mistake the tone in Dumbledore's voice for being anything but final. And so they all slowly walked out of the room muttering goodbyes to Charlie and shuffling their feet on the way.

Back in the apartment Harry instructed both of his house elves to go find Dumbledore and tell him all they knew, just as he had promised Dumbledore. As soon as the house elves had disappeared he stumbled into the bathroom. The magic he had done earlier had taken much more out of him than he had realised.

When he awoke the next day, he couldn't remember ever making it to his bed, and was confused to find himself tucked safely under the covers, dressed in a pyjama he didn't recognise. The pyjama was made in a soft silky fabric, and was in a beautiful deep red colour, with gold trimmings and it matched his bed perfectly. It wasn't anything like his own PJ's. They were, as all of his clothes, some of Dudley's old ones that he had inherited.

As soon as Dobby and Winky had left Harry's apartment, they sought out Professor Dumbledore. First they went to Hogwarts and looked for him in his office. When they found that he wasn't there they stopped in with the house elves in the kitchen and asked them if the headmaster was somewhere in the school. As that wasn't the coincidence, they left for the headquarters of The Order Of the Phoenix at Grimmauld Place. They found the old man sitting in a chair in the kitchen with his head buried in his hands in much the same way as Harry just minutes before.

Dobby cleared his troath in an apologetic manner, which resulted in the old man immediately focusing all of his attention on the two house elves. "Dobby and Winky are here to do as Master Harry Potter ordered us to, Professor Dumbledore, Sir. If it pleases you?" Winky squeaked.

"Yes Winky, I would like it very much if you would tell me exactly what you two experienced tonight." Dumbledore said in a way that sounded both excited and mournful.

When Dobby and Winky had finally finished their story, Dumbledore's expression was more than deadly serious. It looked as if he had just learnt that man could fly without a broom, which ironically enough, in a way was the case. "Are you two sure that's precisely what you saw? And he didn't even have his wand out?" Dobby and Winky nodded once each and there was a long silence. Then suddenly Dumbledore jumped to his feet and grabbed Dobby and Winky's small hands. "Would you take me to him immediately?" His voice was filled when concern, and the two elves didn't even look at each other before they snapped their fingers and brought Dumbledore with them to Privet Drive, more specifically Harry's apartment.

As soon as they arrived, they scanned the living room for any sign of Harry, but as he clearly wasn't there and they found it highly unlikely that he was in the training room, they peeked their heads into the kitchen and then rushed into the bedroom only to find it empty. For a moment they stood there looking at each other baffled, then they turned to share a worried glance and then crossed the hall to the bathroom.

The sight that met them made Winky let out a small scream, and when Dumbledore though about it later, he would swear he had heard Dobby swear under his breath. That was another first for the day.

Harry lay sprawled on the floor of the bath room, a mess of tangled arms and legs, and a small stream of blood running from an open wound near his scar, where he had apparently hit his head on the floor when he fell. It was obvious that even in his unconscious state he was having a nightmare as sweat was poring of his forehead and mixing with the blood in a rather large pool on the floor.

Dumbledore quickly bent down checked Harry's pulse, just for good measure, and then he turned to Dobby. "Go find Madam Pomfrey for me Dobby and bring her here, but make sure she doesn't now where she is being taken. And please make sure to arrive directly here in the bathroom, in that way there is less she can recognise. And tell her to bring a blood replenishing potion, a dreamless sleep potion, and whatever else she needs, when the patient has extensive magical fatigue. Hurry now! Oh and if she complaints Dobby, just tell her: _Phoenix feather_!"

Dobby left immediately only to re arrive only half a minute later with the strict healer by his side. Madam Pomfrey had a basket filled with potions in the hand dobby wasn't holding, but she nearly dropped it when she saw the state Harry was in. Almost instantly she whipped out her wand and began swinging it back and forth over Harry's limb body while muttering something under her breath. 15 seconds later when she was done, she muttered a quick spell and closed the wound on Harry's forehead with a flick of her wand. Then she turned to Dumbledore and with a very calm and very frightening voice she spoke a single word, that made both of the house elves jump backwards in fear. "EXPLAIN!"

Dumbledore however didn't cringe and simply looked tired when he spoke. "As far as I can gather he has almost depleted his magical reserves completely. And when he was sent home, he must have collapsed before he could get to bed. I'm afraid I wasn't aware what he had done before I sent him here. If I had known I would have called for you immediately Poppy." Dumbledore sighed and the sorrow in his voice softened Madam Pomfrey's features a great deal.

Pomfrey began administering potions to Harry while she had Winky clean his face and hair with a damp cloth. She started muttering, and it was hard to decide whether she was talking to her self or to Dumbledore. "I don't understand it. A boy his age doesn't know any spells powerful enough to so completely deplete him. They just don't. He would have to fire of spells constantly for hours to use this much magic and even then he would have still fainted much sooner." She paused in her mumbling and stopped pouring a purple very foul smelling liquid down Harry's mouth and then turned to Dumbledore. "How is this possible Albus? I know he have been trough a lot, but surely he doesn't know anything powerful enough to do this to him?" The concern in the mediwitch's voice was distinct.

Again Dumbledore sighed and once again he looked much more like an old man, than the mighty Albus Dumbledore. "I'm afraid I can't tell you how this happened Poppy. Partly because I truly aren't sure and partly because no one can know if my suspicions are true. What I can tell you though is that no he doesn't know any spell powerful enough to do this to him - if performed in the regular way that is."

"You know I hate it when you speak in riddles Albus, but I know that you probably got your reasons. As always. That put aside he needs complete bed rest for the next week. And when I get back to Hogwarts, I'll put a batch of potions together that he will have to take every day." She paused for a second, scanning the beautiful Gryffindor like bathroom for the first time. "Where are we by the way? Judging by the tiny bits and pieces I have heard of the boys family, this is not, what was it? Privet Drive, is it?" She asked with scepticism evident in her voice.

Dumbledore chuckled for a bit before he spoke. "Nothing ever misses your attention do it Poppy? Alas I can't tell you where we are. That is a very closely guarded secret; but I can assure you that the boy is still under the blood protection of his relatives. I will have Dobby take you back to the Hospital Wing, and wait there for you to gather all the potions Harry needs. Dobby will wait for you to finish and you'll instruct him regarding which potions young Mr. Potter here needs at what times."

"Not much Albus, not much. But why tell the house elf? Surely someone else will be looking after Potter?"

"No Poppy. Dobby and Winky are in Harry's service now, and I can assure you they are more than capable of taking care of him. Now I think you should return to the school and prepare the potions for your favourite patient here. And if it will sooth your worries, I will check in on the boy myself from time to time." Dumbledore said with a sad but at the same time merry twinkle in his eyes.

"I see. I will do as you ask Albus." Then she turned to Dobby and nodded at him. The house elf grabbed her hand and they instantaneously disappeared.

Dumbledore turned to Winky and explained to her the measures he wanted taken to ensure that Harry would keep his bed rest. When he had convinced the small house elf that this was indeed for Harry's own sake, he took out his wand, muttered about old men making stupid mistakes, and then he transfigured Harry's old, grey worn out Pyjama that had originally been Dudley's into a new silky Pyjama in a beautiful deep red colour with gold trimmings and "H. P." embroidered on the back.

_Back in the apartment Harry instructed both of his house elves to go find Dumbledore and tell him all they knew, just as he had promised Dumbledore. As soon as the house elves had disappeared he stumbled into the bathroom. The magic he had done earlier had taken much more out of him than he had realised. _

_When he awoke the next day, he couldn't remember ever making it to his bed, and was confused to find himself tucked safely under the covers, dressed in a pyjama he didn't recognise. The pyjama was made in a soft silky fabric, and was in a beautiful deep red colour, with gold trimmings and it matched his bed perfectly. It wasn't anything like his own PJ's. They were, as all of his clothes, some of Dudley's old ones that he had inherited. _

Harry went to get out of bet, but as soon as he tried moving a muscle he yelled out in pain. Every muscle in his body hurt beyond belief, he realised that it even hurt to keep his eyelids open. In fact with every other second that passed he found another new part of his body that hurt. The final thing he realised before he fell into unconsciousness again, was that it hurt every time his heart beat. Dobby and Winky had heard Harry's cry of pain, and they rushed into the bedroom in time to see him fall back on the pillow with a grimace of excruciating pain on his face. The two house elves quickly helped each other force Harry to swallow the enormous amount of potions madam Pomfrey had instructed them make sure he got every 8 hours. The first one that went down was a very strong pain remedy, but to the faithful house elves great horror, it only managed to diminish the expression on their master's face, not remove it. They didn't dare give him another dose of the pain reliever, as Madam Pomfrey had told Dobby that this was the strongest pain reliever the Hogwarts potion master could produce.

Following the pain reliever were many different potions of different colour, smell, quantity and effects. Just to mention a few, there were a Dreamless Sleep potion, a blood replenishing potion and a potion to help his body restore its magical reserves. The potion didn't actually restore magic to the drinker; it merely stimulated the process of recovery.

The house elf's took shifts watching their master, but Harry didn't wake at all for the next 24 hours and they had to force feed him his potions and also a bit of soup to make sure he got some energy into his body. They even bothered Dumbledore with a barrage of questions the three times he came to check on Harry, but as soon as they saw the face of the old man fall as soon as he saw Harry, they realised that the Headmaster was just as worried as they were. Every time Dumbledore left he seemed more and more broken, and Winky and Dobby became more and more afraid.

For the next three days Harry only woke 3 times, and each time he was only awake long enough to register that someone was in the room with him, but that it didn't really comfort him, before he screamed in pain again, and passed out. After the three days had passed Harry was pale as a ghost and thinner than ever. The house elves hadn't been able to get Harry to eat anything but the odd bit of soup they could force feed him. During the three days Harry was out, Dumbledore continued to check in on him approximately every 8 hours around the time when he was fed his potions. On the third day he brought madam Pomfrey with him, blindfolded, and she declared that Harry was slowly regaining his magical resources, but that he would definitely have to spend the next week in bed, except that when he got too insistent that he was fine, that he should be allowed to walk around for 5 minutes at a time a couple of times every day. When she had explained everything to Dumbledore and the house elves, she got a dangerous look in her eyes, and started ranting at Dumbledore for not letting her take care of Harry, and demand the she would be allowed to see him twice every day.

As soon as she finished she discovered that she didn't hold the same power over the Headmaster here as she did in her hospital, as he firmly denied her "request". She was absolutely fuming when Dumbledore blindfolded her again and led her from the room.

On the fourth day Harry was awake long enough for him to get tired of his faithful House elves. They fussed about him from the moment his eyes opened, force feeding him every kind of nutrition known to man and wizard, bombarded him with questions, and generally annoyed the hell out of him until he simple collapsed from stress. The next time he woke, he was grateful to them though, as he clearly felt a bit better, now that he had something in his stomach. The second time he woke, he demanded that his elves would let him go to the bathroom, but they wouldn't budge, and finally they actually used their magic to press him back in bed. This just pissed Harry of and he yelled at them for a good 5 minutes, before falling asleep again from exhaustion with the words "I want to talk to Dumbledore…."

Finally on the fifth day Harry and Dumbledore got a chance to talk, as Dumbledore was there when Harry woke around noon. His eyes fluttered open and he found himself, half lying, half sitting in his grand four-poster in his bedroom. In the corner across from him his ageing headmaster sat in a grand armchair with his eyes closed and his fingers stapled against each other creating a triangle. To Harry he looked decidedly tired and worried and he felt a pang of guilt for once again worrying the old man. Harry wondered if his old headmaster was asleep; it certainly looked like it. His breath was slow and even, and he didn't move at all. Harry figured that since neither Dobby nor Winky were in the room, and Dumbledore was asleep he would exploit the situation, and slip of to the bathroom. Surprisingly enough he wasn't exactly dying to go, he merely had a strong urge.

However as soon as he made the slightest movement to get out of bed, Dumbledore had whipped out his wand, and was gentle but firmly pressing him back into his bed. "Good morning Harry. I'm glad you are finally awake; I believe we have a lot to discuss." Dumbledore's eyes were once again filled with that characteristic merry twinkle, but they also reflected an intense curiosity and a longing for knowledge.

At first Harry couldn't even speak, he was stunned by how fast Dumbledore had pulled out his wand, and pushed him backwards. He had not only not uttered a word, it also seemed like the only part of his body that he had actually moved was his wand arm. Harry was simply baffled that his headmaster was capable of mowing that fast. He just sat there for a couple of moments before he shook out of his stupor and declared: "I want to go to the bathroom!" and as an after thought added, "Please, Sir."

Dumbledore chuckled a bit and smiled genuinely at Harry. "As I said Harry I do believe we have a lot to talk about. Madam Pomfrey has also made it very clear to me what she would do if I let you leave your bed within the next couple of days – and frankly I would like to keep my backside intact if you don't mind?"

Harry couldn't help but laugh at the old man, as he pictured a very angry looking Madam Pomfrey chasing Dumbledore down the corridors flinging hexes after him like a mad man. It only lasted for a couple of seconds though as his lungs clearly wasn't ready for that kind of activity jet, and searing hot pain shot trough his chest with each now ragged breath. He didn't even have enough breath to yelp out in pain, but Dumbledore clearly noted his face scrunch up in pain as he quickly muttered a series of spells to ease his pain.

When Harry had finally calmed down enough to regain his composure, he looked his old headmaster dead in the eyes and pleaded with him. "I _really_ need to go Sir. I promise I won't tell if you let me use the bathroom. I know how scary Madam Pomfrey can be. Please"

"I'm sorry Harry but I'm afraid that for once I agree with Madam Pomfrey. It will be for the best if you stay in bed. I can however relieve you of some – shall we say – pressure?"

"That would be great Sir, although I would prefer to use the bathroom my self."

Dumbledore for the third time pointed his wand at Harry and muttered a long and complicated spell in what Harry guessed must be Latin. Gradually as Dumbledore performed the spell he could fell the pressure lift and soon he was completely comfortable again and he nodded his thanks.

Dumbledore spent an hour discussing what had happened to Harry 4 days ago, and why he was lying in bed. Dumbledore explained that as you age, your reserves of magic increase, and that if you completely deplete those reserves your body itself will start supplying power for your magic if you continue drawing power for a spell. This resulted in cell damage trough all of the casters body, and this was why Harry was in such pain. Dumbledore assured Harry that all damage to his body had been healed, but it would still be weeks before he was strong enough to start casting spells again. He also informed him of how long he needed to keep his bed rest, and how much he was allowed to move about the first week. As Harry felt his eyelids becoming heavier and heavier, Dumbledore handed him a vial of Dreamless sleep potion, and assured him that he would be back the next day to check on him.

Harry slept for almost 24 hours and woke to find Dumbledore sitting in precisely the same chair, as he had yesterday, once again with his fingers resting on each other and with his eyes closed. He didn't feel like pressing his luck once again by trying to get out of bed, so he just watched the headmaster for any sign of him being awake. As he found none, he realised that for the first time he was actually hungry, and he softly called out for Winky. She immediately appeared at his side, and looked thoroughly relieved that Harry wanted her to bring him some lunch.

"Winky, I do believe it would be best if you brought Harry here some soup. We don't want to strain his body too much as of yet, and fluent food should do the trick for today, and tomorrow." Winky nodded her head towards Dumbledore and disappeared with a small pop. "And good morning to you Harry. I hope you feel a bit better today?"

Harry rubbed his eyes with his knuckles and put his glasses on. "Yes thank you professor. I fell slightly better. You looked like you were deep in thought professor, or maybe even asleep. Is something bothering you? I hope you don't mind me asking."

"Not at all, not at all. I was merely meditating a bit. I find that I can concentrate best if I close my eyes and press my fingertips against each other like so" He showed Harry the triangle again " I think it is time I tell you a bit about some other uses for meditation than just preparing yourself for Occlumency. You see Harry, not only can you lock away all of your thoughts easier in this way, but you can also sort trough your thoughts, feelings and memories and lock away those that are bothering you, or those that are not. Using this technique you will find that it can be easier to deal with things that are bothering you if you haven't got any distractions, or it can help you keep yourself together and focused in times of trouble."

Harry sat in silence for a bit and thought about this. "Are you saying professor that I could for example lock away all thoughts of the prophecy, Sirius, Voldemort and all the other stuff that's bothering me?" he said with a bit of hope in his voice.

"That is what I'm saying Harry, but I will warn you now, you must use this technique wisely. If you should choose to lock away all those thoughts, you will also lock away the feeling of purpose that you are currently feeling. You will have locked away all the things that are currently driving you towards your goal. And, this is _very_ important Harry, it _may_ all collapse on you at some time if you should choose to do this."

"If it can be so dangerous, then why are you telling me this professor?"

"For that exact reason Harry. I believe that you are an exceptionally gifted boy, and I have no doubts that you would have discovered this by yourself probably sooner than later, and I wanted to warn you of the consequences. Also I would like to urge you to use it to work trough your feelings and come to terms with your losses and your challenges. I will be here to help you if you should require assistance. Would you like to give it a go now?"

Harry regarded the old man with a good amount of curiosity. Was he for real? Did he really think Harry could master something as difficult as that? Harry vividly remembered some of his not so fortunate attempts at meditation, but he figured that asking a few questions at least wouldn't hurt. "Suppose I wanted to try this out professor, how would it work? And how would you be able to help me? I mean last time I tried this it was kind of like walking around inside my own mind. How can you possibly help me then?"

"Those are all very good questions Harry. I would ask you to trust me, but I think we need to work a bit on our relationship before that happens, so I will tell you. To answer your first question you would try to go into a meditative state just as you have done it before. Simply follow what you learnt from the book. I will talk to you all the time and guide you. Once you are completely calm, and enter the landscape of your own thoughts emotions and feelings, I will perform the Legilimens spell on you, and you will concentrate on _letting_ me into your mind. This will feel strange at first, I can tell you that, but not in an intrusive way. You will not be able to _see_ me, but I will be able to see what you see and I will talk to you in your mind. Together we will then try and sort through and process some of the things troubling you."

Harry considered this for a moment, and decided that he better ask one more question just to be sure. He found it wise to worry about his health for once. "Ehmm, Professor? Does this classify as doing magic? I mean I want to learn and all, but I really want to get back to my training too. I don't want to delay my recovery at all."

Dumbledore's eyes twinkled madly at this and a warm smile spread across his world wary face. "I truly hoped you would ask about that Harry. You always were one of my cleverer students. These techniques actually do require a bit of magic. I do however have a very good reason for wanting to teach you this now Harry. First of all it will speed your overall recovery, and I must say I have ulterior motives too. Those I would rather we discussed in a couple of days though. Before you ask; I promise it will be soon Harry. I'm afraid our time is rather short. But back to the meditation. As I said it do require a bit of magic, but the amount required is indeed very, very small. In fact you need not perform a spell; it's more of a skill that wizards have, that enables us to dwell deeper into our own minds than muggles. The amount of magic needed is something of the equivalent of a tenth of a standard feather levitation charm. It is of course entirely up to you if you want to trust me on this Harry, and I must admit I'll understand if you don't. I'm quite aware that I don't entirely deserve it." Dumbledore's face fell as he spoke the last sentence and he actually looked down at his shoes.

Harry was astonished to see the old man look so sad, and even though he still didn't fully trust his old Headmaster, He really wanted a fast recovery. When he thought about it a bit more he realised that maybe Dumbledore deserved a second chance. He had after all been very kind to him in the last couple of days. Well actually he had always been nice to him.

Apparently Dumbledore though that Harry's silence indicated that he wasn't yet ready to trust him, and therefore he started to get up. "I'm sorry Harry. I understand your hesitation to trust me. I'll be back tomorrow." He was now fully standing, and started heading for the door.

Harry Hadn't realised that he had been thinking for so long. "NO, no. I want to trust you Professor Dumbledore. I want to give you another chance. Please come back. I didn't realise I took so long to answer –I'm really sorry!" The words just stumbled out of him, and when he finished rambling he realised that he really did feel sorry for not trusting his Headmaster. He didn't know why, but somehow that was how he felt.

Dumbledore turned slowly around and stared at Harry with obvious disbelief in his eyes. "You are willing to give me another chance? Thank you Harry. That really means a lot to me. Thank you!"

"You are welcome professor. I want to believe that everybody deserves a second chance – although I might find it a bit difficult to give Malfoy – or Lockhart a second chance. Before we begin, I think I would like to have some food."

"That sounds very sensible Harry. I guess Winky will be finished with your soup shortly."

Harry was about to call Winky when he remembered what Aunt Petunia always did. "Would you like to join me professor? I'm sure it wouldn't be a problem for Winky to make a bit more."

"Thank you very much Harry that would be wonderful. Why don't you just lie back for a bit and rest. I'll go help in the kitchen."

Dumbledore almost jumped from his chair, and practically skipped from the room, and Harry couldn't help but chuckle at the sight. He figured that Dumbledore never really got the chance to cook. At school the house elves always did it, and he was probably too busy anyway. And at Headquarters it was probably always Mrs. Weasly who did the cooking. She never did like to have anyone help out. Harry felt a small sting as he thought of her but he quickly squashed it. He didn't want to loose his resolve. He WAS going to keep everyone at a safe distance from him.

Harry leaned back into his pillow and tried pushing all the thoughts crowding his head away, and soon he nodded of.

He woke again to the sound of someone softly calling out his name, and to the smell of a vide array of foods. Soon he was sitting in his bed turned a bit sideways contemplating all the delicious food Dumbledore and Winky had placed on a high table that was pushed up against his bed. There were loads of different soups. Actually there were more soups than Harry had ever seen in his life. And it smelled delicious. Gradually Harry realised that something was weird. He couldn't put his finger on it, but there was definitely something that was wrong. Suddenly it jumped up and screamed in his face. Was Dumbledore standing up at the table? He couldn't possibly reach over the edge of the indeed very high table if he was sitting in an ordinary chair.

Dumbledore apparently followed his puzzled expression and then just laughed and lifted up the plain white tablecloth that Winky had draped over the table. To Harry's great surprise and delight, the old headmaster was sitting on a barstool, and gently rocking his legs.

Harry started to laugh, only to bend over and yelp out, as pain shot trough his lungs, throat, mouth, teeth and last but not least his heart. If his head had been raised up probably, he would have seen some wicked fast wand work once again, but as he wasn't he only heard Dumbledore quickly mutter a string of healing and pain relieving spells, followed by what definitely sounded a lot like a vary bad swear word.

Harry regained his composure enough to sit up straight again and meet the worried faces of his two trusty house elves and his Headmaster and friend. Friend? He wondered about that for a moment, and then realised that he was beginning to feel a bit more for the Headmaster. He would worry about that later. He gratefully accepted the purple bubbling potion that Dobby was stretching out against him, and downed it in one gulp. He recognised it as the strong pain Relieving potion that he had had so many times during the last couple of days. Than he realised that Dobby hadn't been there 15 seconds ago.

"Thank you Dobby. Where did you come from?"

"Dobby was just as masters other house... and …. Ehh" Dobby glanced up at the headmaster and then regained his self-control a bit "and doing a bit of work for Mr. Dumbledore. Yes that was what Dobby was doing Master Harry. Dobby felt that his Harry needed him, and now Dobby is here!" he finished with a huge smile, and only a bit of worry in his huge tennis ball eyes.

Harry carefully put on a wide smile. "I'm sure you were Dobby, I'm sure you were. Thank you for coming. I'm fine now, I really am. You can go back to what you were doing for professor Dumbledore. And remember Dobby – no punishing yourself!" Harry half yelled after him, as Dobby more or less bolted from the room. Harry figured that that was something else he would have to ask his new friend about soon.

When he had assured Winky that he was fine and she had left to carry out some work in the kitchen, he and Dumbledore sat in silence and ate for a while. Soon though they were chit chatting and Harry found he felt rather like he was talking to an old friend. Dumbledore seemed to enjoy himself too, but when they had just sat and talked for half an hour Dumbledore called Winky in and had her clear the table.

"Thank you for a delicious lunch Harry. It was most kind of you to let me join you. I think we need to get started, as I'm afraid I don't have all the time I would like."

"It's all right Professor. I'm actually anxious to get started too. I'm not entirely sure what we are going to do, but I really look forward to doing something else than just lying here."

Dumbledore gave a smile at this, and said. "I can imagine it must be tiresome to just lie there all day without anything to do. What I need you to do is let yourself relax completely, get comfortable and concentrate on your own feelings and memories. Just like when you have practised your Occlumency. When you are ready, give a small nod and we will begin."

Harry nodded, then lay back and closed his eyes letting himself relax. When he felt completely relaxed and focused, he gave a small nod. Soon he heard Dumbledore mutter _"Legelimens"_ and immediately memories started flashing before his closed eyes. As fast as they had begun, as fast did they disappear. He heard Dumbledore's, inside his own mind, instruct him to start locking away the memories and thoughts which didn't bother him, in the same way he did when practising Occlumency. Harry found it was a tad more difficult moving around single thoughts compared to just a mass. Dumbledore worked with him though, and soon they had just a handful of memories left that bothered Harry in some way or another.

There was the memory of Sirius falling trough the Veil of course, a memory of lying in the dark in the cupboard under the stairs feeling all alone and scared, a memory of being hit by his uncle Vernon, the memory of Ginny lying as good as dead in the Chamber of Secrets, and finally the memory of Ron lying on the bottom of the lake.

Dumbledore helped him work trough the last four memories first. The way it worked, was kind of like being in a pensive, only Harry couldn't see himself, but merely observed the scene playing out from a birds point of view. Dumbledore was with him the entire time, speaking to him when he needed to get things out of his system. This technique was particularly helpful with the memories of Ginny and Ron, and how afraid he had been when he had thought he might loose them.

Working trough the memory of Sirius's death was far more difficult, but in the end Harry came to realise that there were no way it would help Sirius for him to feel neither guilty, nor for him to blame himself. Sirius was in a better place now, and he had been reunited with his best friend.

It was late afternoon when they finished, and Harry was so exhausted that he barely managed to stay awake to say goodbye to his professor, and hear that Dumbledore advised him to use this technique when ever he had a problem.


	6. Recovery Sucks!

Chapter 6: Recovery Sucks!

The next two days sped past in much the same way. Harry would sleep until long into the day, when he got woken up by Dumbledore. They would then spend half an hour talking while Winky or Dobby made some lunch for them, and they would enjoy it mostly in comfortable silence. They would then work hard in Harry's mind until Harry literally dosed of. Dumbledore had still not let Harry get out of bed, but had performed the spell that removed the _strain_ on Harry's stomach and bladder. The one time Harry had woken during the night he had figured that it would be nice to actually go to the toilet, and so he had gingerly swung his legs over the edge of his bed. He made a grimace of pain but he stayed silent. Unfortunately this didn't seem to fool his faithful two friends. The second he had both legs over the side of the bed, he felt himself lifted up and pressed back in the bed.

"Master Harry need's his rest! It's is dangerous for him to get out of bed! Master Professor Dumbledore says so to Master Harry. Winky heard yes she did. Now Master Harry go back to sleep." While she spoke, Winky appeared from a dark corner of his room and soon she was standing in Harry's bed and glaring down at him while shooting daggers with her eyes.

Harry found that he was very reluctant to contradict the small creature towering above him. He didn't have any doubt that she was furious with him for trying to get out of bed.

"I'm sorry Winky." He tried to look at his feet, but that really didn't change that much as he was now just looking at Winky's stomach. "I will go back to sleep now. It's just so frustrating to not be able to get out of bed, you know?"

Winky's face fell and changed into one of compassion. "Winky think she know. Winky can se that master Harry is very bored. But Master Harry must stay in bed so he can get well fast. When Master Harry gets well there is …. " Winky abruptly ran to the corner of the bed and started banging her head on the pole and muttered to herself. "Winky must not tell secrets, Winky must not tell secrets!"

"You stop this instant Winky! STOP!" Harry roared over the top of his lungs and soon he was panting heavily as pain once again took residence in his body. This resulted in Winky jumping from the bed in fear and backing up against the wall with a horror-struck look on her face. When Harry had finally calmed enough for him to breath normally, he spoke again.

"Winky, please get over here. I won't hurt you, you know I won't. I'm not mad at you. I just don't want you to punish yourself." Winky slowly got over to the bed and sat on the edge where she to her surprise got engulfed in a soft hug. Harry just held her like that for a little bit, while his head was working furiously. "Can you tell me who it is you are keeping a secret for Winky? Is it Professor Dumbledore? If it is, then don't worry about it. I'm sure he will tell me when he finds that the time is right. But you MUST NOT punish yourself. Remember that is part of our deal. You will only ever punish yourself if I specifically tell you to, is that clear? I want you to promise me!"

Winky just threw herself around Harry's neck and sobbed heart wrenchingly into his shoulder. "Master…. Harry… is…. far… too… gooood …. to … Winky. "

It took Harry a good fifteen minutes to calm Winky down, but when he finally succeeded, and had promised her he wouldn't try to get out of bed, he had NO trouble falling asleep again. If he knew what tomorrow would bring he wouldn't have fallen asleep so easily.

Next morning he awoke earlier than normal. His internal clock read somewhere between 8 and 9am. When he had rubbed his eyes, he fumbled around for his glasses, and to his great surprise he found someone handing him them. As the world sprang into clear view as he put his glasses on he looked up into the smiling face of Remus Lupin.

"Good morning Harry. I'm sorry if I woke you. But perhaps it's for the best. You have a couple of jobs to do today you see. Dumbledore wanted to be here to do them with you, but unfortunately he had a meeting with Fudge that he could not get out of. He told me to reassure you he would rather be here with you. He might drop in later though."

"Good morning Professor…. Ups… Sorry…… Remus. What kind of jobs?" Harry's curiosity was kind of peeked now.

"Well first of all; how are you feeling today Harry? Do any of your muscles hurt? Your legs? Or lungs and heart? I would like you to try and sit up on your own and tell me how you feel please."

Harry shot Remus a puzzled look, but did as he was told and sat up straight. To his delight (and surprise) he didn't feel any pain at all. "I feel fine thank you. No pain at all. Well I'm kind of hungry. Do I have time to get some food before I do whatever it is you want me to do?"

"That's good then. Why don't I just go and get you some food, and then you can just relax for a bit and make sure you are properly awake. I'll be right back."

"Thanks Remus. Be sure to make some for yourself if you want to. And ask Dobby or Winky if you need help with anything."

Harry ate his breakfast faster than a starved wolf, he was so anxious to get started. He hated just lying in bed all day, and he was growing tired of fooling around inside his own head. However he soon regretted having practically swallowed his food, as Remus merely laughed at him and ate at a more decent pace. Finally Harry couldn't hold his tongue any more, and blurted out. "Oh will you get finished soon Moony. I know you are just stalling to tease me! What are we doing today? Magic? Do I get to train? PLEASE!"

Remus almost fell of his chair he roared so much with laughter. When he had calmed down a bit he managed to explain to Harry that today was the day he was getting out of bed for the first time, and that although they were going to the training hall, it was only to walk around for a bit, not for doing magic. They still weren't certain when he would be allowed to start that part of his training yet.

Harry almost jumped. He had thought that he would be allowed to practise some weak magic before he was let out of bed. He definitely loved the prospect of being able to go to the bathroom. "YES! Get out of my way Remus! I'm going to use the toilet!" Without further ado Harry swung his legs over the side of the bed and jumped to his feet. Well that was what was supposed to happen in Harry's mind at least. In reality his knees buckled under the sudden strain, and Remus only just caught him before he hit the floor.

Remus chuckled a bit while he helped Harry back to his feet. "I think it might be wise if you take it slow for a bit Harry. What do you say I walk you to the bathroom, and if that happens without too much difficulty, I might even let you take a shower on your own. Believe me I would rather have it if I don't have to bath you." He chuckled again, and laughed merrily when he saw Harry's face rapidly changing to resemble Weasley hair. Harry was just too stunned to speak, and instead just nodded and took the first step of the day gingerly.

However Remus' laugh soon disappeared from his face when he had to catch Harry 6 times during the first small 10 steps. Harry protested furiously when Remus insisted on following Harry into the bathroom, but Harry gave in when Remus offered to go get Winky, Ms. Weasley or Madam Pomfrey instead. Apparently Harry didn't like that idea, because he immediately hit Remus on the shoulder. This surprised Remus a great deal, but he was able to put a steadying hand on his shoulder before he lost his balance. When Harry had finished his business with Remus waiting patiently outside the door, he stripped down and headed for the shower grabbing everything in his way for support. When the bath hangings were firmly closed around him, Harry very reluctantly called Remus back in. They had made the deal, that if Harry wanted to take a shower, Remus wanted to be present with his wand ready in case Harry slipped.

Within half an hour Remus was sitting in the middle of the training hall in a soft leather chair mounted on a spinning plate, and Harry was gingerly walking around the edges of the hall. At first he repeatedly needed to sit down, and every time he stopped, Remus conjured a hard wooden chair for him to sit on. When Remus had done this the first time, Harry had protested that he wanted a soft chair too, however he dropped that when Remus had to stand up and come over to help him get out of the soft chair he had conjured instead.

When noon rolled up Harry was sweating like he had just played 4 hours of excruciating Quidditch, but his entire body was feeling a lot better, and he could walk around without problems. Remus sent him off to take a shower on his own, and while he was in there Remus made lunch for both of them with a bit of help from Winky.

Soon Harry was finding himself sitting in his best chair with his stomach full, and strict orders from Remus to relax, preferably sleep, for half an hour. He didn't feel any strong urge to argue. Soon he was snoring mildly. He didn't even notice when the fire that softly crackled in the fireplace turned green, and a tall stately man with long white hair and beard, dressed in midnight blue robes stepped from it, glanced at him with a fond smile on his face, and silently stepped over to the couch and sat down beside Remus. Soon the two men were whispering along in awed tones. Neither of them could believe how fast Harry was recovering but they agreed to not let him know that he was doing any better than they expected. They then discussed the plan for the rest of the day, and agreed that they better both stay. Their combined persuasion skills would be greatly needed.

Harry yawned. "Good day ´Professor. Did everything go well at the ministry? If you don't mind me asking?"

"Good day to you too. And yes everything went as planned, though I must admit that Cornelius was rather reluctant." Dumbledore chuckled a bit before he continued. "It was really rather amusing, but that is not relevant. Remus tells me that your walking exercises are progressing nicely. Perhaps you would like to give at another go?"

Harry smiled at his Headmaster, got up from his chair, and practically skipped into the great training hall. Within the next to hours he was lightly jogging around the edges even though both Remus and Dumbledore were very concerned. They didn't say anything, but a muggle could have sensed the anxiety pouring of them in waves. When Harry picked up the pace to a slow run, it was the final straw for both men, and they shot out of the chairs at the same time.

"I think it might be time for us to move along Harry. I believe Remus has already informed you that there is more than one thing we have to do today." Dumbledore looked at Harry over the top of his half moon spectacles, and Harry thought he saw wonder in the old man's eyes, but quickly cast the thought aside as he got curious about the second task of the day. He sincerely hoped that it would be as enjoyable as being able to get out of bed and start moving his body. Maybe they were going to practise some magic. He could do with casting a few curses to vent the last bit of frustration, that he hadn't gotten out trough his exercise. "If you say so Professor. And yes Remus did tell me that there was something else that I have to do today, but he didn't explain what. Are we going to practise a few spells? I could do with hexing a few things…" To demonstrate what he meant sent a weak stunner in the general direction of the two men, with a flick of his arm, and a twist of his finger.

The effect was not nearly what he had hoped for. Split seconds later Remus was having him by the shoulders and practically screaming from the top of his longs just how irresponsible he though Harry was. Dumbledore didn't seem any more impressed with his display than Remus, and when Remus was done shouting he looked very sternly at Harry, and just said with a slight shake of his head. "I understand that you are frustrated with not being able to train Harry, but you must not do magic as of yet. Perhaps you can start out in the small in a week's time, but not until then. To tell you the truth, it's quite extraordinary how much energy you have had today, and how well all of your body reacts. I have a suspicion that you might have done a bit of healing on yourself Harry, and that have probably slowed the progress of replenishing your magic a great deal. So for now, you are to do absolutely NO magic at all, until I personally say so. Do you understand me?"

"Yes Sir. I'm sorry Sir." Harry stared at his shoes.

"I understand Harry. Why don't you go ahead and take a shower, and then Remus and I will prepare our next job. I think you might need a bit of help with that. Off you go."

Harry quickly left the room with his head hung low and headed for the shower. He used a great deal more time than necessary in the hope that he could wash away some of his guilt, and in the hope that Remus and Dumbledore might not be as mad at him when he was done.

When Harry re-entered his living room, he found Dumbledore and Remus sitting on the couch talking pleasantly about something school related, Harry didn't quite catch it before they broke it of and offered him a seat opposite them in a soft armchair. He noticed that the dining table was nearly covered in fresh roles of parchment, several new quills and an assortment of inks in different colours.

As he sat down he put on a tentative smile and asked. "I hope I'm not doing lines?" Dumbledore quickly swallowed a chuckle and Remus disguised his laugh rather poorly as a cough.

"In fact that is exactly what you are doing Harry, only it is not meant as a punishment. But we will get to that in a bit. Before we get to the fun part, I'm afraid we have some rather serious business to discuss. I think it is time that you tell Remus everything about your plans. I daresay you are going to need someone to talk to, and even though I've come to enjoy our talks, I am not always available. What do you say Harry? It is your choice after all."

Soon Harry had told Remus everything about his plans for the year, and Remus sat back in his chair in silence for a long time clearly deep in thought.

"I understand your motives Harry, but I must say that I fear that it may not be good for you to separate yourself from your friends. I won't intervene though. You are almost a grown man now and a decision like this you must make on your own. I will promise you that I'll help you all I can if you choose go through with it though." Remus looked thoughtful for a second "But how are you going to make it work. There will be loads of difficulties, won't there?"

Dumbledore cut in before Harry could answer. "I agree with Remus, Harry – there will be a lot of problems. First of all you would need to be sorted for the students to believe a story about you being an exchange student. And since you of course couldn't be in Gryffindor, the Sorting Hat would most likely put you in Slytherin, and we can't risk that. In fact you probably couldn't be in any house at all, since you can't keep your disguise up while you sleep. And for an exchange student to have his own room, just wouldn't do, I hope you can see this?"

Harry's face fell, but he nodded. He did understand, he just hadn't thought that far. "So the plan is off." It was not a question, more like stating a fact.

"Seen from a certain point of view, it would certainly look that way." Dumbledore's eyes twinkled furiously before he continued, and Harry had the distinct feeling that he was in for a nasty surprise. "However Harry I think I've found a solution to our problems."

Harry jumped in when Dumbledore made a slight pause to ready himself for the explanation he was about to give. "Problems Sir? Our problems? Not my problem? I don't understand…."

"I was just coming to that Harry – I trust you remember your … hmmm… DADA _professor_ from last year?" Harry gave an amused nod. He wasn't sure he had ever heard professor Dumbledore be so clearly sarcastic before. Dumbledore continued. "I though so. As it is, Miss Umbridge unfortunately won't be able to join us at Hogwarts this year, and I find myself in a predicament – There isn't any applicant's for the job as DADA professor you see."

Harry's expression was baffled. He actually looked like he had just seen Professor Snape dancing very closely with Professor Trelawny, kissing very passionately. Which would have baffled him quite a lot. "I see professor. I just don't understand…?"

"Well as I was pondering what to do when I came up with the perfect solution. I have a great favour to ask of you Harry." Suddenly Dumbledore's eyes weren't twinkling anymore, but shone with concern and his entire face was entirely serious. Harry had a feeling that there was something in his headmaster's eyes that he quite couldn't put his finger on. Was it… Pride?... That didn't seem to make much sense. Harry's train of thoughts were shattered as Dumbledore's next word swept trough all the chambers in his brain and went straight to his heart.

"I need you to study harder than you have ever done before Harry, and I need you to do it in less than a month. I need you to specifically learn two year's worth of DADA before the start of term. I believe you can do this Harry – with a lot of help of course. Next I need you to take your DADA exam on the 31st of August. And finally, but certainly not least I would very much appreciate it if you would accept the position as Hogwarts newest DADA professor."

Remus let out a gasp at Dumbledore's last words, but otherwise kept his tongue and just turned to stare at Harry with pride and horror in his eyes.

Harry decided that now would be a really good time to pass out, but somehow his body wouldn't let him, and he just sat there with his mouth wide open and his eyes locked at a place far beyond any wall in the room. The tidal wave of thoughts that were passing trough him were more than he could handle, and suddenly, he closed his eyes, swept his legs up under him, and tried to calm himself. This proved to be quite impossible. Still he needed to sort all his thoughts out, and the only thing he could think of was to utilise the technique Dumbledore had thought him, what seemed like just moments ago. Suddenly he felt kind of a soft knock on the door to his mind, and an image of Dumbledore's face appeared before his closed eyes. Harry was grateful that his Professor understood that he needed help, and gladly welcomed him in. Seconds later there was a second knock, and Remus was there too giving his full support. Trough the combined effort of both his professor a soft calm soon spread to every dark corner of his mind, and Harry was suddenly able to sort trough his thoughts. When he had spent 15 minutes sorting trough it all, with the calming presence of Dumbledore and Remus always there, he gently prodded them to leave his mind, and soon the three of them were sitting back in the living room.

"I see now. Thank you so much for your support, both of you. I really needed help making sense of all this. I can understand that this will solve a great deal of our problems, but won't it also create some new ones. I would still need to go to other classes. Would the Ministry let a student teach?"

"Under normal circumstances, no they would most definitely not. This was one of the reasons I visited Minister Fudge today Harry. Your cover story when you go back to Hogwarts will be that you were home schooled, particularly so in the Dark Arts. Cornelius was rather reluctant at first, but when I remembered him of all the mistakes he made last year, he suddenly seemed a lot more open to ideas. He did insist though that you take the standard DADA NEWT before you start teaching. Oh and he also demanded that you aced it. Of course Cornelius haven't got a clue that it's you I want teaching, and we will keep it that way. For all this to be feasible you would of course need to be able to practise with your wand from today on. That was the other thing I spoke to Fudge about today. He has agreed that after the fiasco of last year, it would be wise to give you permission to perform magic outside of school. Thus the Restriction for underage magic has been lowered to 16, in regards to you. The only question remaining is whether you would do me the honour of becoming part of my staff at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry?" Dumbledore's voice at his last sentence had become very formal, and if Harry had ever had any doubts whether it was all a joke, was washed away by the headmaster's voice.

Harry took a deep breath and steadied him self for what he was about to do. "It would be MY honour Sir. Although I dare say I'm going to need a lot of help getting ready for the exam. And won't it present a problem that I can't train yet? I must be in a terrible rush. And I also need to learn the transfiguration spell. Will I even be able to sleep?" Harry sighed as he realised exactly how much work was ahead of him.

"Splendid Harry! All the practical issues we will discuss later. For now we have some much more pleasant things to do. Do you know what day it is today Harry?"

Harry looked baffled for a while – why the sudden change of subject? And Dumbledore's eyes were twinkling with a very Fred and George'ish look to them. "I'm not sure Sir? Tuesday?"

"That's right Harry, it is Tuesday, but what date?" Both Dumbledore and Remus were wearing looks of pure delight on their faces.

Realisation suddenly dumped a bucket of cold water Harry's head, and his face fell. "Well that's another birthday I won't have any fond memories of."

Immediately Remus and Dumbledore's faces grew sombre. It was Remus who first regained his ability to speak. "I'm sorry Harry I…."

Harry cut him off before he could finish the sentence. "Don't worry about it. I never had what other people would call a nice birthday before, so actually it might have been better than usual, because I didn't notice that I lacked a proper birthday party. I wouldn't have wanted one anyway. It would have kind of undermined all my other efforts."

"I see Harry. However as a testament to how remarkable a young man you have grown up to be, you still have a small mountain of presents to go trough. And before you start on the whole you want to send them back – NO! These people have sent you gifts because they care about you, and I want you to read ALL letters that might be attached to the presents. This is where the _doing lines _comes into place."

"I get it Professor. If all goes well, these people won't see _me_, for quite some time. I'm writing thank you letters, aren't I?

"That was indeed the plan Harry. But why don't you push that a bit back in your mind for the moment. For now – presents!"

Remus smiled warmly at Harry, and as though they had rehearsed it all, Dumbledore immediately flicked his wand in the direction of the corner with the ladder that led out of the trunk. Harry turned around and saw the familiar sight of the dark wooden ladder, only to a split second later loose sight of it, as a jumbled mess of colour appeared stacked high in the corner, completely hiding the exit from view. Gifts of all sizes, shapes and colour all with different wrappings, and practically all with a letter attached. Harry's heart skipped a beat and he sat frozen in his seat, just looking at the mountain of presents before him. When he finally spoke, it was barely in a whisper. "….But I don't even know that many people."

"Well they know you, or know of you Harry. Apparently a lot of people thought that you could use a proper birthday, following all the business with the ministry and all. I do believe that even Minister Fudge has sent you a letter."

There had been lots and lots of presents, and therefore lots and lots of letters to write. The letters to Ron and Hermione had been the most difficult to write, and together they had taken almost an hour to get done. He had been very week in regards to what he felt, he had instead tried to explain to them that it was for the best if they didn't write to him, and that he really appreciated their presents. Hermione had (of course) sent him a book. It looked very interesting and Harry couldn't help but think of his dad, Sirius and Remus whenever he looked at it. He couldn't wait to get started. Ron had sent him a new broom polishing set, and a bag of chocolate frogs. From Mr. and Mrs. Weasley Harry had gotten a knitted purple jumper and a muggle electrical toothbrush. The twins had sent him a big bag of tricks from their new joke store, Weasley Wizarding Wheezes, and a note saying that Dumbledore had wiped something from their memory, but that they couldn't remember what it was, but they felt it was important. Harry had had a weak idea, what that might be about, so he just held up the note for Remus and Dumbledore to see. Dumbledore looked worried for a second and then his face returned to its normal mask. "Nobody besides, you, I and Remus know about your trunk, and therefore this apartment anymore. All the others agreed to have the memory of it wiped, for the sake of your security. When Moody, Tonks and Kingsley are coming to train with you, I'll send them directly into the training hall by portkey, and I would like it if you were already in there when they arrive. There is no reason to fuel their curiosity, you see." As he thought about it now, Harry had no problem understanding that it was for the best, but he still thought of it as just another secret that he had to keep.

There were lots of other presents. Of course there was the entire trunk/apartment from the order, which was by far the coolest present Harry had ever gotten. All his friends in the DA had pooled together and had bought him a very cool and expensive looking cloak that was made of a heavy fabric lined with soft deep purple silk. That however was not the most remarkable thing about the cloak. On the outside of the cloak were fastened thousands of black scales, which shimmered with an eerie purple glow that matched that of the silky lining. Harry remembered how he had been sitting with a large gift on his lap, wrapped in bright paper that alternated between being gold and silver. It had a magnificent deep blue bow, and Harry had picked it out as one of the first, but hadn't dared opening it until the very end. That's how beautiful it was. When he finally slowly undid the bow, and ripped of the paper he found a beautiful oak box inside, with his name engraved in the lid. When he tentatively opened the lid he was amazed that the cloak inside was even more beautiful than the gift had been when it was wrapped. As he pulled out the cloak Remus who had been leaning forward to see what was in the beautiful gift, let out a gasp and even Dumbledore looked a bit surprised. "Do you mind if I ask you who sent you that Harry?" Dumbledore's voice had suddenly become very serious. Harry who apparently was the only one who didn't know what it was that was so special with this cloak inspected it closely before answering. "Its from the DA sir. It's beautiful. And incredibly light. It must be charmed with some kind of weight lightening charm. But what's with the scales? They look kind of familiar, but I can't quite place them?" It was only the first five words that Harry spoke directly to Dumbledore, the rest kind of faded in volume until he was almost whispering. He fingered every inch of the cloak, and examined it closely, completely transfixed by it, his face showing the same kind of glee, it had shown when he had first seen his family in the Mirror of Erised. He didn't even notice that Dumbledore had started speaking again, not until Remus suddenly cut Dumbledore of and asked: "Is that really one, Albus? They are supposed to be incredibly rare!"

Suddenly Harry was very curious as to what his two closest adult friends could tell him about this new gift. "I'm sorry Sir, did you say something?"

"Yes Harry, indeed I did. And although I can understand that you are fascinated by it, I must insist that you let me use a few minutes to examine it. Actually Remus should probably help too, if he will?"

"Of course Albus, but you surely don't think that….?"

"No, I don't Remus. But a gift as extraordinary as this… Well as Alastor would say: CONSTANT VIGILANCE!"

Harry cut in he didn't understand what it was that was so special about his new cloak that the headmaster would want to examine it personally. "Excuse me Sir. If you think it's for the best that you take a closer look at it, I guess I'll trust you, but you won't damage it, will you?"

Dumbledore chuckled a bit although his face was still serious. "No I won't damage it Harry, unless it is cursed with some extremely dark magic" As Harry's face instantly fell, he quickly added – "But I don't believe that is likely at all. If you'll just hand me it, then Remus and I will give it a look over, and we'll be back in less than 10 minutes."

Harry reluctantly handed over the cloak to Remus and Dumbledore, and the two men left hurriedly trough the fireplace. Harry wasn't surprised that they went to Hogwarts and not headquarters. After all, they were supposed to be the only ones knowing about Harry's new _hideout_. While they were gone, Harry went over some of the other presents he had gotten. There were bags more or less stuffed from lots of people from school and even some from people Harry didn't know. Tonks had sent Harry a book on Human transfiguration, with a note attached that said:

"_Happy Birthday Harry!_

_I remembered how you asked me whether you could learn to be a metamorphagus, and I figured that even if you can't; then you might have more reason to be able to change your appearance than most others. Do enjoy the book, lots of the spells in it are really fun! I would ask you to be careful, but then again if I did that, I wouldn't be me, would I? Once again, Happy Birthday!_

_Love, _

_Tonks"_

Harry could clearly imagine Tonks' laughing face, as she watched Harry change his nose to resemble that of a pig snout, and next to resemble that of a Snape snout.

Kingsley had sent Harry a wrist holder for his wand that would enable him to draw his wand in one fluid motion, and keep it concealed in the arms of his robe when he needed to. It was made of soft and flexible leather, and Harry had put it on immediately, and after a bit of fumbling he was now wearing a concealed weapon. He could remember hearing someone saying something like that in a muggle criminal movie, and he laughed out at the thought of how fitting the Dursley's would find it if Harry was arrested with a concealed weapon.

"May I ask what you find so amusing Harry?" Dumbledore asked from behind Harry's back his eyes twinkling merrily.

"You may, Professor. As long as you don't expect me to answer. I'm afraid you wouldn't find it as amusing as I do Sir."

Dumbledore shot Harry a curious glance, but nodded and said "Very well. You are entitled to have your secrets Harry. Remus and I have checked the cloak with the help of a few other professors, and we have not been able to detect any tampering with it, although I must say some of the others were rather curious about where we got our hands on such a rare cloak. But enough about that. Why don't you try it on Harry, then we can demonstrate what's so special about it. That is if you haven't figured it out on your own yet?" Dumbledore's smile was now threatening to break into a full laugh, but he held it in. Instead he nodded towards Remus who stepped forward and put the cloak around Harry's shoulders. Dumbledore conjured a full-size mirror in front of Harry, who eagerly studied himself in it. That was until he saw Dumbledore and Remus's reflections lightning fast draw their wands, and heard them both shout stupefy with all their might, and two red beams of light sped toward Harry's back.

Harry was so surprised by the actions of the two persons he trusted most besides Ron and Hermione that he simply froze to the spot, and just watched in slow motion as the two red beams proceeded towards his back. For some reason Remus and Dumbledore was both casting some strong shield charms. Harry couldn't figure out why they would do that… Certainly they didn't think that he would have time to fight back? But if wasn't really Dumbledore and Remus, but Deatheaters using polyjuice, he would have to fight back. If it was a fight they wanted, a fight they would get! Harry felt a surge of hatred towards all that was evil and wanted to hurt anything else course trough his entire body and he knew that he would never go down willingly. Harry wasn't sure how to do it, let alone if he was able to but he immediately tried to conjure a shield up without his wand. He instantaneously realised that it was too late. The shield did come up, and it seemed immensely powerful - it shimmered with a strong golden glow that was so bright that the deatheater posing as Remus fell to the floor and cried out in pain as he clasped his hands over his eyes. The deatheater posing as Dumbledore clasped a hand before his eyes, while he at the same time stumbled a step backwards.

The only problem was that he hadn't been fast enough, the two red beams of magic was _inside_ the shield he had made. Harry tried diving out of the way, but the same moment he went to leap to his right, the two curses hit him hard, square between the shoulder blades. As Harry already had set his muscles in motion, they continued the jump, and added with the power of the two curses it sent him flying head first into the wall. The last thing Harry remembered thinking before he succumbed to the pain was … "Why didn't the stunners work?"

Harry lay crumbled on the floor in a heap of legs and arms pointing in angles they weren't supposed to, and with a small but steady stream of blood pouring from a deep cut just above his right eye. Further back in the room, two figures could vaguely be seen trying to fight down the shield that somehow still separated them from getting to Harry. They were almost immediately joined by two more figures, also trying to get trough the shield which stretched trough the entire room like a wall. At first the 4 figures had tried getting the shield down with various shield disbanding charms, but soon they reverted to raw violence as nothing seemed to affect it.

They didn't get the shield down before one of them had left, and brought back a fifth person, and then it still took the combined effort of all of them. As soon as the shield fell all but one of them jumped forward, trying to get to Harry first. The last person who had arrived hurried to the fireplace, and immediately vanished, only to reappear with a sixth person in tow seconds later.

Harry slowly drifted into consciousness. He had a calm and secure feeling in his entire body, but something in his mind told him that this wasn't how he was supposed to feel. He kept his eyes closed while he pondered what could be wrong about feeling safe and secure. He thought that he was actually feeling very good and he simply couldn't figure out what it was that kept nagging at his mind. That was until realisation jumped at him from a dark corner of his mind. His eyes immediately sprang open and took in his surroundings. He was lying in his own bed, back in his pyjamas and besides his bed Dumbledore was standing holding out a wand. Harry was just about to try a bit of wandless magic again, when he realised that Dumbledore wasn't pointing the wand at him, and that it was actually Harry's own wand Dumbledore was holding out laid flat in his palm. The headmaster had a very sombre expression on his face, and they weren't alone in the room either. Behind Dumbledore stood 5 very worried looking people; Remus, Dobby and Winky stood directly behind Dumbledore all with worried and frightful expressions on their faces. Behind them stood Bill Weasley and Madam Pomfrey; Bill was deep in thought and hadn't noticed that Harry was awake and although he didn't appear as worried as the others, his face definitely expressed care. Madam Pomfrey looked just like she always did whenever Harry was around. Her face wore a bit of a frown and her eyes clearly showed that she didn't approve of having to perpetually patch up Harry. Harry was inclined to agree with her.

No one spoke even though they had by now all realised that Harry was awake, they merely watched Harry as he took in his surroundings and put everything together in his mind. They all jumped as Harry's arm shot out of nowhere grabbed his wand and pointed it straight and Dumbledore's face. The only one whose face didn't look at all different from usual – was Dumbledore. He merely smiled sadly at Harry and said "May I please sit down and explain Harry?"

Harry was certain that there was definitely something out of place with this whole deal, and the fact that Dobby and Winky was both there did calm him a bit. He was intent on not showing it though, and he simply said "Please" with a hint of false politeness in his voice. Dumbledore was about to draw his wand to conjure up a chair but the slight trembling this resulted in is Harry's wand made him freeze. Without thinking Harry used his free hand to wandlessly conjure a plain wooden chair next to Dumbledore.

The collective gasp that the four humans in the room let out at the unimpressed ease Harry displayed in conjuring a chair without a wand startled Harry a great deal and he only JUST averted his hand before the nasty slicing hex his ragged nerves and lightning sharp reflexes had produced cut the head of the man standing nervously by his bed. Harry let out a sigh and motioned for the man by his side to sit down. "You better not make any sudden movements or sound any of you. As you can see my nerves are a bit strained at the moment."

Dumbledore proceeded to explain that he and Remus had thought it would be a fun way to demonstrate what exactly his new cloak could do, if they shot two stunners at Harry so he could see that the curses would just deflect off of the dragon scales the cloak was covered with. He proceeded to tell that Dobby and Winky had appeared the second he had jumped and hit the wall. When they found that they couldn't get the wall shield Harry had conjured down, they had send Dobby to get Bill as they figured he was the only one that might be able to get the shield down.

At this point Harry could tell Dumbledore just longed to ask what kind of shield that was and how Harry had produced it, but he only stopped for a micro second before he continued to explain that they had finally gotten it down using their combined strength and mostly brute force. At this time Dobby had made his second trip to go and get Madam Pomfrey.

There was a short break where no one said a word, before Dumbledore finally sighed and said "I'm truly sorry Harry. I should have expected the effect this little prank may have on you, but I'm afraid it's becoming a habit for me to make mistakes when it comes to you. I just hope you someday will be able to forgive an old mans foolishness.

Harry wanted to believe that this was indeed his headmaster, his friend but he had to be sure. There was way too much on stake to take any chances. He was the only one that would be able to defeat Voldemort and that must always be his first priority. "How do I know this is not all just a trick? A way to make me let my guard down? Convince me that you are who you say you are. Prove it!"

Dumbledore seemed to have expected this as he tentatively leaned forward very slowly and whispered something in Harry's ear.

The affect was evident immediately. Harry visibly paled for a few seconds until his face grew determined and he resolutely lowered his wand and sent everyone a weak smile. "I'm very sorry about all this. I guess I need to relax a bit more." He gave a small laugh and soon they were all laughing merrily; they all found that it was the best way to deal with a sad situation that all in all was a bit ridiculous.

When they had all finished laughing Bill cleared his throat and was clearly about to ask how Harry had produced the shield, but Dumbledore held up his hand to silence him. "I would like to know just as all of you do. But IF Harry can explain how he did this, I'm afraid neither of you are going to hear about it just now. In fact you need to forget all about it. With your…" Dumbledore made a barely noticeable pause before he continued "permission… I will remove the memory of this entire incident from your minds, and then I'll send you by portkey to Headquarters. This is of course a security measure to protect both you and Harry." Dumbledore stood as both Bill and madam Pomfrey nodded their consent and advanced on them with his wand drawn. He first looked bill deep in the eyes and mumbled a spell under his breath, and then he repeated the procedure on Hogwarts' own nurse. When he was done both of them had dazed looks on their faces and he quickly transformed a quill into a portkey and showed it into their hands. As soon as Dumbledore let go of the quill Bill and Madam Pomfrey were whisked away to the headquarters of The Order of The Phoenix.

Dumbledore turned to Remus and nodded at him then he turned to Dobby and Winky. Thanks for you assistance, you were a great help. I would like it if you would leave us now, I think the three of us need a little talk, and I'm sure you both have duties to attend to. Dobby and Winky looked at each other then turned their tennis ball eyes towards Harry.

"I'll be fine friends. I'll call for one of you if I need anything at all." Harry smiled as Dobby and Winky turned around and left the room trough the door, Dobby clearly mumbling something that sounded a lot like "….calling Dobby his friend…. Greatest wizard ever… Very proud…" followed by a loud sob.

Dumbledore who still had his wand in hand transfigured the plain wooden chair Harry had conjured into a big squashy purple armchair with a flick of his wand, sat down and proceeded to conjure a pink but otherwise identical armchair next to his own.

Remus thanked Dumbledore and sat down and let out a small sigh of delight as he sunk three inches into the chair. "You gave us quite a scare there Harry." Remus smiled wearily at Harry and was about to continue when Harry cut him of.

"Yeah. I guess I did. But you can't really blame me. It was after all you guys who decided to give me a scare in the first place. And before you ask, I don't know how I made that shield. I just thought that I needed a shield and that I needed it bad. The rest merely happened." He turned his head towards Dumbledore who was sitting with his fingers stabled together his jaw resting on the top and continued "You are welcome to take a look trough my memories and see if you can find anything Sir, In fact I think we should make it a priority to find out how to make a shield like that. It could be very helpful in the battle against Tom."

"I believe you Harry, I don't think you consciously know how to make a shield like that and I also agree that it would be a great asset against Tom. However I fear that this is something we will have to research later. For now we have some more pressing concerns." Dumbledore fell silent although it was evident to both Remus and Harry that he wasn't finished talking, and so both of them just watched their mentor and friend gather his thoughts. After a few minutes of just staring into nothingness Dumbledore suddenly snapped back to reality and spoke again. "The most important thing we need to focus on right now is getting your training up to NEWT level. When we called madam Pomfrey here I was ready to drop the whole thing as I was sure she was going to tell me that you had depleted all you magical resources once again. What is extraordinary is that this is not the case. In fact she informs me that you now have an abundance of magic present in your system, way more than should be even possible for a boy your age." Dumbledore's voice trailed of once again and Remus and Harry looked at each other with bewilderment written all over their faces. It was Remus who first found his voice.

"How is that possible Albus? I mean that was one of the most, if not the most impressive bit of magic I have ever seen, and now you are telling us that Harry is fine? That he actually has a surplus on his magical reserves? How can that be?

Harry nodded his assent – That was exactly the same questions that were battling each other for the front row seat in his mind.

"I'm afraid I can't answer those questions, I would indeed like those questions answered as well myself. However that's another thing we will have to research later. Are you aware that something else, hmmm how to put it, extraordinary, happened today Harry?"

By now Harry looked like one giant question mark, and judging by his face one would be tempted to conclude that he would go to sleep in a position exactly like one. "Extraordinary, Sir? Besides the whole shield business and the fact that my magic has somehow suddenly returned? No I don't believe I noticed anything else of that magnitude."

"At exactly the same time as you conjured your shield Harry, there was a scream form out in the house. It appears that all the plants inside your aunt and uncles house are dead, and even some of the plants outside the house seem drained of all their energy."

The entire next day Harry spend in his bed, because even though madam Pomfrey had declared his magical supplies abundant, she had also decreed at least one days supervised bed rest, on the grounds of a possible concussion. Harry had tried getting out of bed in the morning, but his faithful house elves were all too efficient at their job. They had put some kind of magic around his bed, so he could move around on it freely, but he couldn't get of it. Harry figured it could be everything from a modified gender line to a modified age line. While he was at first irritated by this, he soon realised that this was a perfect opportunity for him to read in his special book. He called Dobby and asked him to retrieve the book for him and soon he was sitting with the dusty old tome in his lab, probed up against a crumbled blanket and his pillows.

Harry realised that it had been a LONG time since he had gotten any training done, but he hoped that his mentor would forgive him when he found out about his recent achievements.

He gently ran his hand over the old cover, grabbed the corner and slowly opened the book to the first page. He had figured that he would be facing some kind of rant, but instead only one line was printed on the top of the page.

_Are you alright?_

Harry a bit baffled by this, managed to sound get out that he was fine, but it was evident in his voice that he was surprised.

_Are you sure? And why would you be surprised? Didn't you think I would be worried about you? Didn't think I was capable of it maybe?_

If there had ever been a doubt in Harry's mind that his book had its own personality it was certainly gone now. There was no mistaking that the book was offended.

Harry started a sentence but all that came out was complete gibberish, and he would swear he heard a faint laughter in his mind. "I'm really sorry, but to tell you the truth I had not thought that much about who or what you are. I underestimated you I guess. I'm sorry." Harry meant what he said, but the feeling in his stomach told him it was rather odd to feel sorry for offending a book, but then again he couldn't think of anything ordinary in his life.

_Apology accepted. _

_Now tell me Harry, are you really alright? Or better yet let me have a look inside your mind and then you won't have to explain what has kept you from your training. How does that sound to you?_

"Can you do that? Are you a legilimes?"

_Now don't you be stupid with me boy._

_How do you think I can alter the text in the book after what you want to know?_

_To answer your question, no it's not strictly legelimensy, although it works in a similar way. The small part like knowing a question before you ask it is easy. But reading your mind is another thing altogether. I can't do that if you won't allow me to. And to answer your next question yes I knew you would ask that, but I find it immensely boring to be the only one talking. So what will it be?_

Harry thought about this for a moment. He knew from experience that he didn't like people poking around in his head, but on the other hand he didn't feel like recollecting everything that had happened since he had lastly talked to his book. As soon as he thought that he realised just how stupid that sounded, but then again what could you expect? He was a wizard after all. "Yes, you can do it. I don't feel like telling you everything on my own. I guess you will get a better understanding of what happened this way too."

A soft golden glow emitted from the centre of the book and hit Harry's forehead just a few centimetres right of his scar. Harry didn't feel the pain and sense of something unwelcome entering his mind that, he usually had when Snape performed legilimensy on him. Instead it felt more like someone gently turning the pages of a book, although it was in a very calming way. It only lasted for 10 seconds, then the beam faded into nothing and words started appearing on the page.

"………… _I would say I'm sorry but I know that you don't care about that sort of thing, and it is obvious that you are fine now. No concussion by the way. No instead I'll say well done! Very well done indeed. Levitating yourself like that… And creating that shield. Hell I would have been more than impressed that you managed to fire of a stunner. I understand that you are a bit puzzled by this whole levitating yourself thing, and obviously the shield too. I can't say that I'm not as baffled as you are, but for now I think we better get a bit of training done. I understand you wont have much spare time during the next couple of weeks. I wish you good luck with that, before I forget it. Now to your practise…"_

Harry spent the rest of the day recapping what they had already been trough and after that they worked on summoning and banishing charms. They were only disturbed once when Harry tried summoning a book with one hand and a bottle of ink with the other. The crash was rather loud and the mess was unbelievable. This of course made Dobby and Winky appear in the room instantly only to get them completely covered in black/blueish ink. They both scowled badly at Harry and without a word cleaned up the room and disappeared again. Harry had the distinct feeling the he was definitely not in his house elf's good graces at the moment. When he thought about it he wished he had a picture of it. He was willing to bet any amount that George and Fred would love to create a prank that simulated that. By the end of the day Harry had no trouble summoning two objects at a time, His banishing the items still needed a bit of fine tuning as they had a tendency to go a bit further than he intended, but the book emphasised that this was a good thing, as most people found it difficult to make their items reach their destinations at all. Harry just needed to realise that he was more skilled at this than he himself believed. When he finally closed the book and wanted to clean himself up a bit before he went to sleep he had to scream a bit before Dobby and Winky would let him leave his bed for the bathroom, and then they still escorted him on both his sides and waited just outside the door.

Harry slept soundly that night.


	7. Constant Vigilance

Chapter 7: Constant Vigilance!

Dumbledore had decided not to tell anyone else in the order about the shield Harry had conjured and only warned Moody, Kingsley and Tonks that they might want to avoid scaring Harry. Moody had apparently overheard this as he the next morning slammed the door open to Harry's bedroom and shouted "Constant Vigilance!". He found it immensely amusing to start the training of his new Auror recruits in this way, and he figured that this wasn't all that different. Kingsley and Tonks only just realised what he was about to do before he slammed the door open, and therefore their warnings never quite left their lips before Moody hid the floor with a frozen smile on his twisted face, his eyes staring into nothingness. Kingsley only just managed to get up a shield to cover Tonks and himself before the next two stunners from Harry's outstretched hands would have hit them as well.

Harry was jerked awake at the sound of his bedroom door being slammed open, and he could only just make out a seemingly huge figure entering his room in great strides and so his reflexes kicked in. He stunned the first person screaming out stupefy and thus drowning out Moody's own shout, which could easily have identified the intruders. As soon as the body in front of him started dropping, he could make out two more people behind the first one and he immediately fired of two more stunners, which to his regret was deflected to the ceiling. He felt naked without his wand as he only mastered very few spells wandlessly. He sent some more stunners at the two forms in the doorway but they were easily deflected by now and he was getting rather desperate. He fired of some more stunners before he suddenly got an idea.

He stretched out both hands and shouted "Accio shoes!" He didn't even really believe it would work, but the result was rather spectacular.

Kingsley and Tonks normally wouldn't have had any problems defending themselves against the stunners that Harry sent at them, but they were rather hard pressed as they were used to people using wands against them, using a certain movement, which they subconsciously timed their defences after. However to their amazement here they were pinned down buy a 16 year old schoolboy, who they were supposed to teach, who was using nothing but his hands to attack them. They had tried shouting out to Harry, but he couldn't hear them over the noise of his shouts of "stupefy" and their shouts of "protego". As they almost always worked together they had developed a very good understanding of each others body language, and could usually communicate to some extent without words. They were shouting furiously at each other weather they should just drop their shields and take the stunner when Harry used the cheapest but most effective trick any of them had ever seen.

The force of Harry's summoning was something to be reckoned with but it wasn't enough to actually draw the shoes and their wearers to Harry. However it was plenty forceful to drag the legs from under the two persons in the doorway, and their shields immediately dropped which Harry exploited by stunning them before they hit the ground.

5 seconds later only one thing went trough Harry's head: "Oh shit!"

10 minutes later the three aurors and Harry was sitting in the living room drinking steaming hot cups of tea to calm their nerves. Moody had a rather confused expression on his face, Tonks and Kingsley just stared first at each other, then at Harry, then back at each other. No one spoke while they finished drinking the tea, but as soon as Harry finished his cup and sat it down words started spilling out of his mouth apologising over and over again.

"Stop right there lad." Moody interrupted forcefully. "Dumbledore warned us that you were a bit on an edge at the moment and even if he hadn't, you would have nothing to be sorry or ashamed of. I should be the one to be ashamed. I thought it would be fun to wake you in the same way I usually start of my new auror recruits. For that I'm sorry. That said I think you have a bit of explaining to do. First I want to know everything that happened after I went down like a 1 month rooky, and after that, I would very much like to know how you managed to stun me without your wand."

Harry tried holding his head high and look Moody in the eyes while he recalled what had happened, but every few seconds he would find his eyes drifting towards his shoes. He couldn't help it, but he still felt ashamed that he had reacted like he did.

When Harry stopped talking a heavy silence descended the living room, and Harry felt like starting to apologise all over again when Moody finally spoke.

"I'm sorry lad but I think you have to run that last bit by me again. You took out two top auror's and members of the order, by summoning their shoes?"

Harry didn't know what to say, but he definitely wasn't proud of what he had done. Instead of using some proper duelling move, he had resorted to a childish trick. If he could he would have transformed into a mouse and crawled away under a floorboard, that's how embarrassed he was. His train of guilty thoughts was interrupted my Moody.

"HAR, HAR HAR HAR… HAT HAR HA HA HA HAR HAT HAT…."

To Harry's great surprise Moody was almost rolling on the floor laughing in a strange sort of guttural way. When Moody's fit ended he collected him self and turned to Tonks and Kingsley his face suddenly grave. "You two better be glad this can't go on your official records. Instead you better learn from this. The way Harry here took you out was absolutely brilliant! No person in his right mind would try summoning an opponents shoes – which is what makes it brilliant. It was unexpected, simple and effective. I wish I had come up with that move! HAR."

Kingsley and Tonks just looked at each other their faces showing nothing but disbelief. Harry wasn't sure whether it was because Moody had told them off, or because he had laughed like that, or maybe because he had praised Harry right in front of their eyes.

Half an hour later Harry had eaten a bit of breakfast while Tonks and Kingsley recovered a bit, and now he was training vigorously in the grand training room. Moody had said that they would start out slow, but Harry already felt like his heart was going to pound it ways out of his chest. Moody had Harry run lengthwise in the room shooting weak hexes at targets along the sides, and simultaneously duck the stunners Kingsley and Tonks shot at him. Apparently Tonks and Kingsley felt they had to redeem themselves a bit, as Harry kept finding himself jumping over one stunner, just to be hit by another. It was clear that Kingsley and Tonks were used to work together.

When they had taken out Harry like that the first 5 times Harry found himself being aggravated by it and it ruined his concentration enough to make him miss every single target and have Moody shout at him to get his act together. This only aggravated Harry more and on his next run trough he demolished the targets with the strongest spells he could remember, and with his left hand he summoned small weights from the weight rack in the corner, only to banish them straight at Kingsley and Tonks. The two aurors had no trouble protecting themselves from the attacks, but it threw of their coordination just enough for Harry to slip between their hexes and get to the other end of the room unchecked. By now Harry was completely exhausted and he told Moody so. The old head auror just ushered Harry out of the room and told him to get a bath and have a 15 minute break and then come back. Harry had an ice cold shower and felt refreshed when he got to the closed doors that led into his training room.

Harry had put his hand on the handle, and was just about to press it down, when he thought better of it. If he knew Moody right, the half crazy old auror probably had something nasty in store for Harry as soon as he entered the room. Harry didn't feel like being stunned or hit with a stinging hex or something equally unpleasant, and so he quickly decided that entering the room in the usual manner was probably not the best idea.

He stepped a few paces back, took a running start, jumped, started his roll and in the absolute last second used a combination of _alohomora_ and a banishing charm to bang the doors open.

He had figured that he would get a couple of meters into the room, roll and get up gracefully as a cat. However once his already airborne body passed trough the now wide open doors, everything started going wrong. As much as Harry wanted there was no way he could stop the graceful roll of his body from hitting dead centre into the desk standing just inside the door. There were no aurors shooting nasty hexes at him instead they were all standing near a blackboard quietly discussing something. They all turned their heads towards the sound of the doors banging up, only to completely crack up as they watched Harry dive head first straight into his desk.

When Harry later thought back to that moment, he was pretty sure that he had never been so embarrassed before in his entire life. Moody and Kingsley had been good about it and stopped laughing fast, but Tonks had been teasing him mercilessly for the next 3 hours until Harry had finally had enough and had banished both Tonks' shoes while she stood with the back towards him. The result: Tonks dumping to her behind both legs straight forward and her nose white from the chalk dust she had scraped of all the way down the blackboard. Moody and Kingsley were both laughing too hard to tell Harry of and Harry himself had tears in his eyes from laughing so hard.

When Tonks had finally gathered herself and straightened out her clothes and general appearance she grinned evilly at Harry and mouthed "This is WAR", when Moody and Kingsley had their heads turned away.

Other than that the day had been almost like a normal DADA class, only it was far better than any Harry had ever attended. The aurors all took turns explaining the spell they were currently working on, and while one was speaking the other two were showing of how to perform it properly. When Harry understood the theory perfectly he was allowed to practise the spell and when he had gotten the hang of it all three of his teachers would point out how they personally performed the particular spell. Harry had always thought that there were only one way to do a spell correctly, but he soon realised that everyone had different stiles to their wand movements and pronunciation how ever minor they might seem. Kingsley's wand movements were micrometer precise and he would perform the exact same movement over and over again, opposed to Tonks, who's stile was more relaxed bordering on reckless. Moody explained that Kingsley's stile ensured that he always performed the exact same spell with the exact same strength, where Tonks' spells were greatly affected by her mood and temper as that was what guided her wand movement. This resulted in Tonks being able to put just a bit more power in her spells when she felt strongly about something, but had the opposite effect if she really didn't care.

After watching Moody perform several different spells of various natures Harry couldn't quite put a word to what his stile was. When he had watched several more spells being shot from the aurors wand he realised that what he was watching was cool efficiency at work. If there were corners to be cut; they were, but not more than that it would not affect the power of the spell. Harry quickly decided that he wouldn't like to dual Moody 1 on 1.

At the end of the day Harry felt like he had had his head cut open at the top and had someone stomp down knowledge with a sledgehammer, only to have it sealed rather poorly. Before the three aurors left Tonks whispered Harry in the ear, that Dumbledore sent word that Harry should remember his other training. Tonks looked pleadingly at Harry to find out what it might be, but Harry just shook his head and sent her of trough the Floo Network.

Harry was dreadfully tired, but he decided it was best to do as Dumbledore wanted and so he sat down in his favourite chair closed his eyes and started clearing his mind. At first Harry was unsure of how to archive all that he had learned during the day, but he soon found out that he could imagine his mind as a long hallway full of doors. After that discovery it didn't take long for him to figure out which doors to put the different spells behind. Harry found lots of doors that had interesting titles on them, but he wasn't sure he wanted to go exploring before he was a bit more skilled at this meditating thing. The only door Harry actually stepped trough was the one labelled "_People in my life_". Inside he found a room very similar to the revolving room at the department of mysteries. It only had 8 doors but every time the room turned the length of a door, the names on the doors changed. Harry found that there were countless doors. He figured that there must be a door for every person he had any memory of. Some doors had pictures on them and no name, and it was obvious to Harry that this was people he only knew by face. Some of the people he had met the very first time he was in The Leaky Cauldron were among these. Harry had watched the doors changing for what felt like forever, and he still hadn't found any of the three aurors he had new memories about. In frustration he talked to himself "Oh come on just show me someone... Moody... whatever!" As soon as he had even completed the thought the room started spinning furiously only to stop with the door named Alastor Moody right in front of him. "Why didn't I think of that before….?" Not many moments later Harry had put his new memories in their right place, and he left the room and his subconscious, and entered the conscious part of his mind. Everything was nice and orderly there by now and Harry decided that it was properly time to get to bed.

The next morning Harry was woken by Tonks who was flashing him her most candy like innocent smile and Harry just knew that the war had begun.


	8. Chapter 8: Constant Vigila… – DUCK!

Chapter 8: Constant Vigila… – DUCK!

Harry reluctantly got out of bed and launched his feet into his slippers, only to jump in surprise as the right slipper started chewing merrily away on his big toe. It wasn't exactly painful, it was just a very unnerving feeling. If Harry hadn't been properly awake before he certainly was now, and he was weary of everything he touched while he got a shower and dressed himself, but nothing else seemed to have been within Tonks' reach. When he entered the living room the three aurors were sitting at the table all feasting on a delicious breakfast no doubt coked up by Dobby and Winky. Tonks had a face of determined innocence on, and Moody kept eyeing her suspiciously but couldn't seem to find anything wrong. Harry decided it would be best to just act like nothing had happened at all, and just sat down and greeted everyone with a cheery "Good morning". This seemed to irritate Tonks a bit and so Harry did his utmost to keep his face calm.

While they ate their breakfast Harry speculated madly on how to get back at Tonks without letting the two other aurors know what was going on.

When they had all more or less finished eating Moody and Kingsley started a hushed conversation and leaned a bit towards each other while Tonks merrily chewed away at a bit of buttered bread. She absentmindedly reached out for a pitcher of juice and Harry recognised it as the perfect opportunity it was. With a tiny wave of his hand and a wriggle of his finger he sent a very weak banishing charm at the pitcher to move it just about an inch. However as Tonks was still occupied by her bread that inch was sufficient to make her tip over the pitcher instead of grapping it.

Orange juice immediately flooded the breakfast table and sent napkins floating like small white rafts over the edge of the table and down the first and last juicefall of their life. Tonks immediately launched into a fit of apologies; however it must be something not entirely new to her colleagues as they just shook their heads and continued their conversation.

Harry on the other hand had a very hard time keeping his features schooled, and as soon as Tonks looked at him her face broke into a grin, and mouthed "I'll get you for that!"

The rest of they day followed the pattern of the previous one relatively good, however as the day lagged towards an end and Harry's head had been filled more than he thought possible once again, and Tonks still stood at the blackboard droning away on the finer finesses of producing a powerful shield, he decided that enough was enough.

Kingsley and Moody had already left as they apparently had a meeting somewhere. Harry realised that he really hadn't listened for the last 5 minutes and decided to let Tonks know he had had enough. He was just about to clear his throat when he decided that Tonks were getting a bit too serious for his taste. Harry grabbed his wand and whispered the Jelly Legs curse as forcefully as he could without actually shouting it. Apparently for Harry the strength of Harry's spell was not determined by the volume of his voice but rather of how strongly he felt about it. Apparently Harry was pretty tired of listening Tonks' droning as her legs immediately buckled under her own weight. Within a few moments the crumbled heap on the floor were laughing merrily and 1 minute later when Tonks had recovered spells started flying like bees after a honey farmer. Harry had taken cover behind his turned over desk while Tonks were hiding behind the blackboard. Tonks were shouting every weak hex she could think of and Harry had plenty to do with defending himself. After a few minutes of furious defence Harry ducked behind the desk completely for a quick breather. He was completely lost for what to do – Tonks was a much better dueller than he had imagined. The only thing Harry could think of was that he needed to do something surprising as he spell for spell had no chance of matching a fully trained Auror.

He was looking around for anything that could tip the match to his favour, but the only thing available was his quill. Seconds later Tonks were lying flat on the floor, desperately trying to fend of the attacking quill. A weak stunning charm from Harry allowed the quill to finish its job, and soon Tonks had "I loose!" printed on her forehead in black ink.

Harry walked over to Tonks to look at his handiwork, and almost burst into tears so hard was he laughing. Tonks entire face along with most of her upper body and forearms were covered in ink spots. On top of that was the words "I loose" written rather shakily across her forehead. Harry was laughing so hard his legs had trouble carrying him and he sat down on the floor so he wouldn't fall. If anyone had been able to see him just then, a safe bet would be that they would have thought he had gone mental. A couple of minutes later Harry was slowly getting his laughter under control only to have the laughter replaced by silent tears streaming down his cheeks. He just sat there next to Tonks, head hung down, sacking shoulders and soft trembles coursing trough his body with every other sob. Having all that fun and now seeing Tonks lying on the floor like that had brought back some very painful memories of a lost friend, almost father, who should have been there to share the fun. Who should have been there to teach him how to deal with all the pressure fate had put on his shoulders.

"I miss you Sirius. I miss you so much. I wish you could come back to me. I hope you are in a better place now, and that that you can finally spend time with your friends. If so, please tell mum and dad hi, and tell them that I miss them too. It's just all so hard. How can this all be true? Why am I the one?"

Harry dried his eyes and gathered himself, then enervated Tonks. Her arms immediately started flaying to fend of the quill that she still thought was there. This brought a weak smile back on her face. When Tonks realised that the quill was gone, and that Harry was standing over her, she started laughing and stammered out in between laughs "what did you do?"

Harry stretched his arm out and helped Tonks up without saying a word. He beckoned Tonks to follow him and then left the training hall, heading for toilet. When they reached the door to the bathroom Tonks, still with a wide grin on her face, grabbed hold of Harry's arm.

"Why have I got spots all over my forearms Harry?"

Harry just gave a small laugh and opened the door to the bathroom and dragged Tonks inside and pointed at the mirror.

"Ohh…. OHHH…. OHHHHHH you are so going to pay for that!"

Tonks spun around fast as lightning and before Harry could even register what was happening, both his face and his bare arms were spotted purple and green. Harry had the distinct feeling that the colouration wasn't limited to those parts of his body, and he didn't like it. But then again it was rather funny he thought.

Tonks just stood there smirking as Harry tried every spell he could think of to remove the creepy coloured spots, but nothing seemed to help. Harry figured that since he couldn't get his spots away right now, and since it didn't look like Tonks were going to help him, he might as well do her the favour back. Hermione had once taught him and Ron a spell to make ink permanent; she found it very useful and had made both of them use it on their exam notes so they would last at least thru school. Harry wasn't sure what would happen if he used the charm on Tonks, but he figured that it was worth a shot. He quickly got his wand out and firmly spoke the words of the spell, "Inkus Permanentus", while he did a fanning motion whit his wand.

Immediately hot air streamed out of his wand and hit Tonks straight in the face. The heat wasn't intense enough to scald her but it did look like it toasted a bit of her eyebrows.

When Harry removed his wand after 2 seconds, Tonks' eyes flew open and she turned around to look her reflection in the mirror. "A permanent ink drying charm? You wouldn't! OH! What's happening? AARRGHHHH!"

At first it looked like the spell hadn't done anything, but soon the words were sucked into her skin and now looked like a tattoo. That however wasn't the reason for Tonks' scream. It appeared the spell wasn't supposed to be used on human skin as it apparently had a nasty side effect. The words started growing and soon the borders of the words met and still the ink started spreading. 1 minute later Tonks' head was completely black, and Harry was rolling on the floor laughing.

Apparently the ink only reached so far, because it stopped spreading once it reached her neck and ended in a ragged, faded line.

While Harry had big trouble stopping laughing Tonks just stared at her reflection in the mirror, unable to speak. Harry figured he better cheer Tonks up a bit, and so he hit her with a weak cheering charm. It was immediately obvious that Tonks had been balancing between finding it funny and wanting to cry, because she launched directly into another fit of laughter. This only amused Harry more, and soon they were both laughing so hard they had tears in their eyes. That was how Dumbledore found them when he arrived to have an Occlumency lesson with Harry.

"Good evening Harry, Nymphadora. I asked the house elves to prepare us a light supper, so if you would please join us in the living room?" Dumbledore kept his voice calm and his facial features didn't flinch at all at the sight before him, but his eyes twinkled with life, and if eyes were able to transmit laughter, Dumbledores eyes would tell tales of 1000 clowns parading in front of him, performing all the most insanely funny tricks one could imagine.

To Harry and Tonks the appearance of the stoic headmaster in the middle of their fit of laughter had the effect of an entire oversize cauldron of water being emptied on their heads. They immediately collected them selves, helped each other of the floor, and headed into the living room, completely forgetting their rather bizarre appearance.

They all sat at the table and waited for the food to be brought in, and Dumbledore, unsurprisingly, was the first to speak. "I assume that you have had a couple of good days training? You had no trouble handling Harry alone when Alastor and Kingsley left for the meeting toady, Nymphadora?" Dumbledores eyes twinkled madly at his last words and Tonks hurriedly stammered that there hadn't been any trouble at all. This apparently was more than the old mans self control could handle and he started laughing merrily. I can see that, indeed. I can recognise the spell that you put on Harry, but it seems your protégé here takes after his father and his friends. What ever did you do to get Tonks' head black Harry?" Harry didn't look up once while he explained what had happened during the afternoon up until they got to the bathroom door. At this spot Dumbledore was laughing heartedly, and motioned for Harry to pause. When he had taken a couple of seconds to calm himself down, he spoke again his voice full of mirth.

"I must admit that was brilliant Harry. I wish I had come up with that! But how on earth did your head get all black my dear?"

Tonks started explaining what had happened next, using a lot of words not suited for any Hogwarts student to hear. Dumbledore just held up his hand and interrupted her.

"I'm sorry but my old ears must be failing me. I only caught very few words out of what you said could you please repeat it?"

Tonks blushed at the well disguised tell of, and started her explanation over again, this time using a less colourful vocabulary. She ended of with: "… and then this little geezer cast a permanent ink drying charm on my face!"

Dumbledore chuckled a bit, well actually quite a lot, at this and drew out his wand and performed a series of complex swings, flicks and jolts and when he was finished he said with a satisfied grin. "I'm afraid I can't remove the permanency Tonks, that is, well, permanent. However I have been able to reduce the extent of the ink to what was originally intended. If you are unhappy with this I suggest you take a trip to St. Mungos – they might be able to do something for you." Tonks swallowed hard at this then shot a death glare at Harry. "You will pay for this my friend, ohh you will pay!"

Faster than Harry had ever thought possible Tonks launched a sausage right at him which hit him directly between his eyes, only to be quickly followed by 3 peas and a tomato. By the time the peas had hit him Harry finally recovered enough to duck the tomato which splattered on the wall behind him, and then he started launching anything he could get his hands on back at the enemy. Dumbledore apparently didn't mind too much as he just conjured up a shield and watched the battle from safety, occasionally conjuring a pie and throwing it at one or the other, apparently not caring which side he was supporting.

Some time later Tonks and Harry were totally covered, mostly in pie, and looked somewhat like giant bizarre gingerbread men. They slowly realised that neither of them were winning, and that it was actually Dumbledore who had bested both of them, while he remained completely spotless. Tonks apparently found that a bit unfair as she tentatively sent a bloody steak flying towards Dumbledore. The steak hit shield with a soft "splat" and proceeded to slide down it leaving a faint trail of meat juice. Dumbledore just sat there and smiled back at Tonks, conjured a pie, and masterly sent it flying to hit a gawping Tonks right in the face. This appealed to Harry's sense of justice and within moments both of the one time enemies were bombarding Dumbledore's shield with anything they could reach. Dumbledore just looked rather amused by this and sent another pie at Tonks, and added one for Harry just for good measure.

Soon the partners in crime were getting sore from all the throwing and from the excessive weight of pie covering them. Reluctantly they stooped throwing and accepted their defeat with bowed heads. Dumbledore let his shield down and with a flick of his wand cleaned both Harry and Tonks right up. Apparently Dumbledore wasn't done with his fun, because both of them were left with the feeling of being scrubbed inside the mouth with a rather large and very soapy brush. As if thinking with one mind Tonks and Harry started throwing spells at the old man in front of them, with every intent to have his head turn purple, grow a tail, make his nose disappear and make his eyelashes grow as long as his beard; Just about any spell they could think of that they would find funny. To their great frustration their aged mentor was if possible more adept at prank duels then at food fights and every thing they threw at him he just beat aside with a small flick of his wand. He even found time to throw a single spell at both of them although they didn't notice anything happening and so they just continued fighting. Harry decided that his headmaster was so much more of an experienced dueller that it wouldn't be unfair to tip the scales a bit in their favour, and so he started using his off hand to send the very limited contents of the table flying towards Dumbledore's face, while still firing of the most ridiculous curses he could think of. While he searched his mind for anything to get an upper hand, anything to make the old man look ridiculous, he suddenly got an idea. So far the unexpected had worked out well for him today and so he squared his shoulders, stood tall and shouted with all his might "ridiculous"! He had no idea if it would work as the spell had been developed to battle a Boggart, but he figured that it couldn't hurt to give it a try. Apparently it was true that one of his strengths was that he was able to think fast in the heat of the battle, because the result was hilarious.

Immediately big acid green ice cones started growing out of Dumbledore's ears, while purple and light blue gummy bears started raining from his nose. His hair turned into long rather yellowish and dry grass, and his skin took on a look of candyfloss. The strangest part however was that his legs turned into a rather beautiful scaly fish tail. Within seconds all the occupants around the table were rolling on the floor laughing so hard, Dumbledore leaving traces of gummy bears and candyfloss everywhere. When Harry and Tonks caught sight of each other they shrieked and laughed if possibly even harder than before. They both had big shiny red noses, Harry was completely white in his face, while Tonks was again black. Their mouths and lips had swollen to at least double size and were stuck in the stupidest grin imaginable and were painted in a bright red colour. Harry's normal jet black hair was bubblegum pink and had somehow gotten afro curls – Tonks' hair was exactly like Harry's but one didn't notice that as much. Last but not least their feet had grown about 3 inches each to complete the look of a muggle clown perfectly.

It took them all a good 10 minutes to get control of their laughter, and even then their were still bursts of sniggering every few seconds which made it very hard to concentrate on getting themselves turned back to normal. Every time one of them were casting a counter curse on one the others, it would be followed by some weak but annoying curse, like jelly legs or "Petrificus partialus" a not so know variant of the complete body bind. After half an hour of removing curses only to replace them with new ones, they finally calmed enough down to get rid of the last bits of stray magic manifesting itself around their bodies. Only Tonks' black words scribbled across her forehead remained. Dumbledore and Harry said goodbye to Tonks who stated that she better visit the hospital before she went home. Harry and Dumbledore agreed that would probably be for the better.

Dumbledore and Harry quickly cleaned the room with some quick cleaning charms and then settled in two cosy armchairs across from each other with a nice cup of hot chocolate each. They worked on Harry's mental shields for a little while but Dumbledore didn't want to try to force his way in, as he thought that they had better have a look on the human transformation spell that Harry had to learn on top of everything else. As Dumbledore didn't know the spell either they both sat down and studied the intricate instructions McGonnagal had produced. Dumbledore would like to learn the spell as well as he had never had the chance before, but he mainly focused on helping Harry and getting him to understand how the spell was supposed to work. They worked well into the night, but had to finally give up as Harry's attention started slipping and his eyelids got heavier. Dumbledore said his good nights to Harry and sent him straight to bed, and then flooed directly to his office.

The next morning Harry was awake early, and was sitting eating breakfast when Moody and Kingsley arrived trough the fireplace. They exchanged good morning's and Harry invited the aurors to sit down and have some breakfast, which they gladly obliged to. Harry could see by the way they kept glancing at him that there was something they longed to ask him, but clearly didn't know how. When they had kept shooting glances at him and each other for 5 minutes while otherwise eating in comfortable silence, Harry grew irritated by their behaviour.

"Speak up – You never struck me as a man afraid to say his opinion Moody, Sir." Harry figured it didn't hurt to add the last "sir".

Moody laughed his very special hoarse laugh, before he spoke. "Why thank you Harry. I guess the reason we were" he glanced at Kingsley "reluctant to ask are that we don' fancy spending 6 hours in St. Mungos."

"6 hours?" Harry sprayed orange juice all over the table. "Why on earth was Tonks there for so long? It was just ink…"

"And a permanent drying charm, and a rather powerful one at that – don't forget that. It appears that they after the 6 hours gave up trying to get rid of the words, and Tonks needs to go back today to see if they can think of something to help her so that she doesn't have to brand you with something equally unpleasant."

The face Harry pulled must have shown a great deal of horror at that prospect, because both aurors laughed out loud.

"Don't worry Harry, I'm sure they'll figure something out. Some of the very best healers in the world work at that hospital. Now although I must admit that you need to practise your spell work, I don't fancy you practising like you did yesterday – not on me at least. So we have to figure out a way for you to practise in a somewhat combat like situation. The way aurors get this training is rather simple. Simply have two opposing forces try to outbattle the other either head on, or with some kind of objective. These kinds of battles are usually conducted with a range from 10 to 50 aurors on either side, but that of course is not what we will have to train you for as you will most likely be alone when the time comes." Moody had been speaking in his usual brisk, no nonsense matter until he got to the last sentence where his voice faded away to nothing more than a whisper.

Harry nodded his head, but needed a couple of moments before he was willing to look up from his plate. However when he did his face showed nothing but determination. It was the haunted, sad and most of all lonely look which only showed in his eyes that worried the younger of the two aurors. Neither Harry nor Moody had any way of knowing it, but he would speak to Dumbledore later that day to voice his concerns.

"So how am I going to train? Duel the two of you?"

"Well we have been thinking about that Harry, and we feel a good way to start you up would to be to create kind of an obstacle course for you. Needles to say it would probably remind you a bit of the final task of the Tri Wizard Tournament, and therefore we wanted to consult you on the idea before we prepared anything. If you are in any way uncomfortable…" Moody's voice trailed of and he looked Harry square in the eye.

Harry had a feeling that his decision on the subject would determine the way the old auror looked at him in the future but he wasn't certain what was expected of him, or for that matter whether he cared to know what was. Because of all the sorrow that had taken permanent residence in his heart after the loss of Sirius, the guilt he felt for the death of Cederic had been kind of numbed but now that he thought about it again, he was fairly certain that it was not something that he wanted to add to the burden he was already carrying on his shoulders.

"To tell you the truth I really don't want to think about that… However I realise that I would have no way of completing this task without you guys helping me. So as long as there are no hedges or other closely confined spaces I guess I will be all right with it."

"I'm glad you are taking this seriously Harry. It will probably take until lunch to make the necessary preparations. Dumbledore wants you to continue with your other studies while we prepare. Understood?"

Harry nodded his head, excused himself from the table and gathered his notes on what he had come to think of as the Morpheous charm. He had decided on the name because it was part of the incantation needed to perform the spell and… well it sounded kind of cool.

Harry found the spell to be extraordinarily difficult to understand, but he was determined to get it right – and get it right soon. Not only was the incantation to perform the spell rather lengthy, also the wand movement was amazingly complex. Where most spells could be completed with a simple swish, flick or thrust the wand movement for this ancient spell was complex. The movement was actually split in 2. The first part was drawing a sharp edged 5 point star and then keeping the wand dead still pointing forward. Upon completion of this a translucent image of the caster would appear in front of him. From that point the caster needed to use mental focus to change the image in front of him to that of what he wanted to change into. This was the crucial part of the spell as it was not enough to simply think: "I want to look like someone else and have red hair". One would need to have a complete mental image of who you wanted to change into, whether the person was real or imagined. Real persons were by far the most difficult to copy as there were so many details to get right. You would be able to transform even if you didn't get it all right but the result would in best case be unbelievable to the observer, and the worst case… Well let's just say that people had been known to loose a nose or an ear as a result of lack of mental strength. The mental image had to be altered within a few seconds or the spell would fail completely. When the caster was happy with the transformed projection he would start moving his wand again this time in an inwards spiral while he with every circle would pull his wand towards his own chest. At the exact moment he reached the centre of the spiral the back of his wand was supposed to touch his chest.

Harry used 2 hours practising the wand movements. At first he had a bit of difficulty with it but soon his Quidditch derived dexterity kicked in and the shapes were getting cleaner and more precise with every try. After the 2 hours of practise the only thing that was still causing Harry a bit of trouble, was getting the timing of the spiral move exactly right. His restless spirit caused him to rush the backwards movement and the result was of course that he hit his chest before the spiral was completed. As Harry was getting frustrated with the lack of progress on this final part of the spell, he realised that his frustration was part of the problem. He decided to drop the practise for now and instead sat back in his chair crossed his legs beneath himself and closed his eyes. At first he just sat there relaxing his muscles until the point where he almost slumped over because he was concentrating so hard on getting ever muscle in his body to relax. He then proceeded to let his mind wander. He found that when he was semi meditative and let his mind roam freely it seemed capable of dealing with the problems nagging him, faster than he were able to do it on his own. While Harry was sitting there trying to let his mind empty itself, Kingsley and Moody were silently finishing setting up the obstacle course they had prepared for Harry.

There actually weren't that many obstacles, they had spent the most of the time discussing how hard to lay into Harry. Moody seemed to think the best approach was to hit him full strength, so Harry knew what was expected of him, while Kingsley believed in a more lax approach. In the end they had come to a compromise. The objective for Harry was simple. Get to the other side of the room, to the green square they had marked on the floor. While Moody had won on wanting to use most of their spell power, Kingsley had gotten his will and had added low walls and rubble spread over most of the room, all of which Harry could use as cover in varying degrees.

When they finished they went to get Harry, but the sight that met them when they entered the living room rooted them to the spot and rendered them speechless for a good 3 minutes. Their eyes registered the impossible in the situation before them immediately but it took a good deal of time before their minds would process the information it received. In a situation like this Moody only know to do one thing. He went over to the fireplace and silently grabbed some floo powder and whispered "Headmasters Office" into the green flames. As soon as the connection was established he stuck his head into to flames only to pull back out seconds later only to be nearly pushed aside by a very worried looking Dumbledore.

"What is it Alastor? You look like you've just seen Salazar Slytherin right here in this house…"

Moody Tried explaining but apparently he was still to flustered by the impossibility of what he had just seen, to be able to speak and so nothing more than grunts and hoarse coughs erupted from his mouth. Instead he just pointed his arm past Dumbledore to where Harry was sitting completely hidden from Dumbledore's view.

Dumbledore sent Moody a confused look and then turned right on the spot, only to almost hurt his jaw as it were heading towards the floor with an alarming speed.

The only thing running trough the minds of the 3 people in the room besides Harry was: "This is impossible. No one can do that. This is simply impossible!"

Dumbledore finally got enough of his sense back to realise that now was probably NOT a good time to disturb Harry, and silently motioned for Moody and Kingsley to take seats next to him on couch from where they could easily watch Harry.

They sat in silence watching Harry sitting in his chair, obviously not asleep but obviously not quite aware either. The odd thing wasn't the look of relative peace on his face, although that would have gotten a lot of attention if it was not for the circumstances at hand. It wasn't his half awake, half not there state either. And even though it was a bit odd that his right index finger kept doing small, lacy circles while pointed in a weird downward angle, that was not at all what had them all so stomped.

You would have been able to hear a snitch drop in the silence of the room. Neither of the three men, who combined had seen most of what anyone would want to see in a lifetime and a great deal they wouldn't, were hardly breathing. In front of them sat a teenager whom they all believed to be destined to become the greatest wizard of the next era, and hopefully the vanquisher of The Dark Lord. The thing that bothered them was that from the circling index finger flowed a soft red/orange mist which formed a cushion beneath Harry. The best way to describe it would be that Harry was sitting 15 inches above his chair resting on a small cloud, which had a colour that suggested that it was being hit by the last rays of sunshine from a late summer sunset. It was a truly beautiful sight but none the less Harry was still floating in a lotus position in mid air. This was something that people had tried to achieve in millennia but had long before present day been deemed impossible. Most inanimate objects could be levitated by a powerful witch or wizard. Humans or other living forms took a very powerful wizard to levitate, but levitating your self was – impossible.

By silent agreement they just sat there watching Harry, neither of them wanting to find out what would happen if they broke the young wizards focus.

Harry on his side was not at all aware that he had company in the living room, in fact he wasn't even aware of the fact that there were anything unusual going on with his body. He had a weak recollection of feeling that he was sitting uncomfortable at some point, but as soon as he had thought that he better do something to get comfortable if he were to focus properly the feeling of discomfort had vanished. If he had stopped to think of it, which he didn't, he would have noticed that he couldn't even feel the chair he was sitting in.

When Harry had enjoyed the comfort of just drifting around in nothingness for some time he decided that it would probably be a good idea to practise some of his Occlumency. One of the things he had read about in the books The Order had gotten him, was that it was not enough to stove away ones thoughts behind the mental door. You also had to create some kind of defence to keep intruders away from the door. Harry quickly stowed away all his conscious thoughts behind the door, and closed it firmly. Harry remembered that the book had described that a common way to start practising conjuring some defences in ones mind, was to "build" a mental wall out of bricks.

This seemed like as good a place as any to start for Harry, only problem was that he was in his mind, and as far as he knew, minds weren't exactly filled with bricks. "I wonder where I'm supposed to get bricks from?" he thought out loud. Unbeknownst to him he also spoke it out loud in the living room which startled the three men sitting on the couch opposite him a great deal. Moody and Kingsley looked from Harry to Dumbledore with a "Has he gone mental?" look on their faces. Dumbledore however looked as lost as they did, and stared even harder at Harry's peaceful face.

Back in Harry's mind a brick simply appeared out of thin air and laid on what apparently was the ground. _I need more bricks… a simple garden wall isn't going to be any use against Voldemort. _Apparently Harry's mind didn't mind taking orders from him, because immediately a mountain of bricks appeared next to him. _Hmm… the book said to build a wall. I guess I'll just have to get going. How hard can it be to build a wall?_

10 minutes later, Harry was sweating badly and his "wall" was now 1 meter long and 40 centimetres high. In frustration he kicked the wall and to his dismay everything just crumbled and landed in a pile in front of his feet. Harry's knees almost buckled under him and he sat heavily down next to his former wall. _I need to get this right! All I wanted was a wall so I can keep Voldemort out of my head – away from the prophecy._

1 millisecond later the mountain of bricks doubled in size and kept growing for another half minute. Harry just watched in awe as brick after brick after brick appeared out of thin air. When it finally looked like no more bricks were appearing the pile had reached a height that Harry, in relation to his own apparent height, guessed was about 300 feet. _Wow… now I just need then all formed into a wall to keep intruders away from the door._ At first Harry couldn't see that anything was happening, but soon the sound of falling stones reached his ears. When he bent his neck all the way back and stared up towards the top of the brick mountain he could see that apparently a single brick had started rolling down the mountain and were now slowly but surely starting an avalanche of bricks heading straight for him. Harry was rooted to the spot not knowing what on earth to do. There was no place for him to go really, and somewhere in the back of his conscious a small voice whispered to him that this was his own mind, and that it definitely wasn't going to hurt him in any way.

Still Harry was growing really nervous when seconds later a full scale brick-slide was advancing down the slopes of the pile towards him. _I asked for a wall not a way to get me killed he thought. _The slide just continued.

As the first brick reached the bottom it landed flat on its biggest side and laid completely still. The next brick rolled over the first, and then settled neatly against the first 1. It was seconds later before Harry realised what was happening. All he could think was: _It's magic!_ The slide was in fact what he had asked for, in a weird sort of way. The bricks were rapidly forming themselves into a circular wall around the door with a diameter so big, that you could easily fit a small town on the inside of the wall. Harry watched in awe as the bricks started falling on the sides of the wall making it thicker while the centre of it was still growing in height. When all the movement finally stopped minutes later, Harry was looking at a 150 feet tall wall that separated him from the door. He could only guess on how thick the wall was, but as far as he had been able to tell while it was still forming, it would be at least 10 feet thick. _Amazing! Hmm… Did I just do something really stupid? How on earth am I supposed to get to the other side of the wall?_ As usual his mind obeyed him and a portion of the wall in front of him, roughly the size of a door, grew transparent right in front of his eyes. Harry tentatively approached the slightly shimmering translucent part of the wall, and when he was only inches away, he reached out his hand and, even though it seemed obvious that it would happen, he was still amazed as it passed right trough it. A second later he was walking quickly trough the passage the wall had opened for him. To his wonder, the wall was actually not 10 feet thick. It was closer to 30 feet! Harry wondered what would happen if the wall were to suddenly close the passage, but quickly abandoned that thought as the passageway immediately narrowed by a foot.

Back in the living room the three men were growing steadily uneasy. It was now more than 4 hours since they had found Harry sitting floating above a sunset lit cloud, and in the last hour they had noted a change in Harry's appearance that worried them considerably. It had started with his facial expression growing a bit more sombre, but rapidly it escalated into his entire posture freezing up as they could literally see most of the muscles in his body tensing up. 5 minutes later tiny beads of sweat were appearing on his forehead, and now almost three hours later the boy floating in front of them was completely drenched in sweat. Moody had at 1 time aired the idea of just shaking him until he returned to the present, but Dumbledore had quickly squashed that idea though, as he had a hunch about what Harry was doing, and that was not something that one should disturb. And so without any real possibilities at their disposal the three men just sat there with concerned expressions on their faces. Even Moody's magical eye wasn't spinning in its socket; instead the clear blue orb was focused completely on Harry's face, as if he could see into his mind if he looked hard enough. They were so intent on studying their ward, to monitor his well being, that they did not even realise that they themselves had been watched for some time. Because of their complete disregard of their surroundings, the three men were startled out of their wits when someone cleared their throat only a few feet from the couch they were sitting on. The voice was strangely inhuman and all three men had their wands out and drawn and trailed on the intruder in what appeared to be record speed. "Stupefy!"

Moody's policy of fire first, ask questions later, resulted in 2 very scared house elves, and a delicious looking roasted chicken now looking like a rather ashen carcass. Dumbledore felt a desperate need to laugh out loud, but his ancient conscious told him that was not what was appropriate here – What was need was someone to comfort the two scared house elves.

Dumbledore kneeled down, and even though his increasingly weak knees gave him some discomfort he kept his facial expression schooled into a gentle smile. It took some time for Dumbledore to apology and explain what was going on, but when he was done Dobby and Winky wore tentative smiles on their small pointed faces.

"Mr. Dumbledore Headmaster, sir… I know sir is worried about Master Harry; Dobby was too when he first saw master sitting on his cloud. Now Dobby knows Master is fine – Master always seem more…" Dobby fell silent and looked as he frantically searched his mind, his big round eyes almost rolled back in to his head as if they might be able to see what his mind couldn't. Suddenly his eyes snapped back and focused on Dumbledore's artificially calm face. "Master Harry seems more calm and…. Dobby knows not the word… Master seems smarter with him self… Does Mr Dumbledore sir understand?" Dobby's huge eyes pleaded with Dumbledore to understand.

Dumbledore gazed thoughtfully at the small house elf in front of him: "I do understand Dobby, Thank you. Could you please set the remaining dinner at the table please? Oh and Dobby? Do you know how long Harry usually stays still like this?" There was a trace of a hint of worry in Dumbledore's voice, but thankfully the house elves didn't seem to notice. "Dobby knows not Mr Headmaster sir. Dobby doesn't spy on Master." Dobby had gotten an offended look in his eyes, but Dumbledore quickly smoothed it over, by assuring Dobby that he hadn't meant to imply anything. Dobby looked thoughtfully at Dumbledore before he spoke. "Dobby is not sure, but Dobby thinks Master has been like this for hours before, but Dobby knows not. Dobby always leave if Master is like this. Dobby and Winky will not risk disturbing Master."

Dobby's last statement hung heavily in the air 5 minutes later when the three men sat at the table eating, all lost in their own thoughts only stooping their forks relentless travel to gaze at Harry still sitting on his cloud. Every few minutes the three men would look away from their dishes and from Harry, to silently discuss whether they should disturb Harry, but they all seemed reluctant to take a decision that could possibly harm Harry.

When they had ate in silence for 15 minutes Dumbledore finally pushed his plate away, stood up and walked over to the couch opposite of where Harry was sitting and sat down. Slowly he drew out his wand, focussed his gaze on the closed lids of Harry's eyes before softly whispering "_Legelimens!_"

Harry was wandering along the inside of the circular wall checking if for cracks, and in general just inspecting his work when something foreign suddenly entered his mind. The presence was clearly on the other side of the wall, and Harry was from the lack of pain is his scar pretty certain that it wasn't Voldemort that had come to visit. On the other hand Harry had a strange feeling about the presence on the other side of the wall, like he knew it. The only person other than Voldemort Harry could think of that had forced their way into his mind was Snape. Harry felt a lot of things about his potions professor, but wanting to have him inside his mind again was very low on his _things to do in life_ list.

"Time to practise this repelling thing a bit" Harry thought. He wasn't too sure of how he was supposed to force intruders out of his mind. He considered for a moment trying some of the things Snape had _taught_ him, but immediately decided that it had all been useless and that he would just go with his instincts, and the few hints he could remember from skimming the later parts of his books. The trick as far as he could remember was gaining control of your own mind, and not letting the intruder get anywhere near where you hid away your memories and thoughts, The problem with this Harry thought, was that he couldn't remember just how to do it. It was something along the lines of using any means necessary to get the intruder out, including playing on their fears, using brute force or even have an imagined duel in the mind. The trouble was that the strongest mind would set the rules for what was possible in the mind. Of course the owner of the mind had a clear advantage here, but if the difference in strength were too great, it would be possible for the intruder to take control.

All this rushed trough Harry's head in a split second and much to his surprise he immediately got an idea of what to do.

Dumbledore was a bit disorientated when he appeared inside Harry's mind. He had expected to be met by a stream of memories as he figured Harry was sorting trough some unwanted memories. Instead he was met by never ending darkness both in front of him, to his left and right and above and below him. When he slowly turned himself around he was startled as he realised what Harry had really been doing. The wall that stood in front of him looked enormous and Dumbledore was very impressed. He knew however that a wall like that would not be able to keep him away from Harry. He tried calling out Harry's name but his voice was lost in the darkness. The moment he started moving closer to the wall he was startled to realise that Harry had apparently realised he was there. The sound of millions upon millions of bricks forming a huge wall behind Dumbledore didn't exactly make him afraid, but he was getting very curious about what Harry thought he had gained by making a second wall around the first 1, with the apparent intruder captured between the walls. It didn't take any longer than for the wall to form fully before Dumbledore realised that Harry had thought further than just capturing him. The outer wall started shrinking in diameter as soon as it was completely formed and immediately there after the inner wall started growing in diameter.

Dumbledore stood dazed for a second, amazed by the aptitude this kid had for magic. From reading vague hints in a book, he had taught himself some pretty impressive mind defence techniques. As he stood pondering the best cause of action; whether to bring the walls down or simply to make a door in the inner one, a movement caught his eye to the left of him. A small orange, almost golden, Siamese kitten came walking towards him. Another movement. A black, not so small, Siamese kitten coming now running towards him from the other side. Startled Dumbledore realised the two kittens were rapidly growing and speeding up until they were in a full sprint. Dumbledore realised that his visit in Harry's mind was about to come to a rather painful end, when he looked up to realise that there were no kittens sprinting towards him anymore, rather a very large and angry looking Lion mother on one side, and a rather hungry looking panther jumping at his throat from the other side.

Harry was shaking with effort as he drew himself out of his mind after expelling the intruder from his mind. None the less he knew someone was in his apartment with him, and they had just tried to invade his mind. Moody's constant nagging about, "Stun first, ask questions later" echoed loudly in his mind and without really thinking about what he was doing, he started wandlessly shooting stunners in every direction. He could only see a few blurry shapes as he had taken of his glasses and his eyes were rather blinded from the light in the room compared to the twilight setting of his mind.

Someone was screaming in the room, Harry figured they were screaming at him, but he couldn't hear above the rushing of blood in his ears. He more felt than heard the distinct sound of a heavy body hitting the ground – then he passed out.

Kingsley was hit straight on the side of his face with the first stunner, as he and moody were bent over Dumbledore who had suddenly been thrown violently back in the couch. Moody alerted by his now slumped over partner and the red light streaming towards him jumped up, ready to hex any intruders. In his shock to see Harry blindly flinging stunners around, he was caught by one on the hip. Dumbledore who wasn't at all ready to fend for him self yet was only grazed by the last stunner, but it was enough to take him out as he was already very shaky from the rather violent expelling from Harry's mind.

Harry was having the nicest dream. His mother was stroking him softly across the forehead mumbling gentle words in his ear. Her small soft hand gently took his and held it, giving it a small squeeze now and again. Slowly the voice got more distinctive and Harry realised it was urging him to wake up. He didn't really want to wake up, but the voice seemed so friendly. A light turned on in Harry's head. Friendly voice. That voice didn't belong to his mother – but – he was sure he knew it, and it still felt comforting to him. The small hand in his was also comforting and the persistent stroking of his hair almost lulled him back to sleep. He felt SO tired. Slowly he managed to open his right eye just enough to see a red blurry shape sitting next to him. Mrs. Weasley he thought. No - his mind answered.

With an effort he managed to open his eye a bit more and to his surprise Ginny was sitting at the side of the bed in his own bedroom in his own apartment staring into nothingness. An apartment which she was not under any circumstances to know about.

"Gin…" The rest of her name got caught in his throat. Harry felt like a sandstorm had raged trough his mouth and throat for days, and he wasn't able to say anything at all.

Ginny was startled a bit by the sudden sound from Harry, but she immediately reached forward and gave him a tight Weasley hug. "Oh Harry. Are you alright?"

Harry noted absentmindedly that even though the hug would contest that of Mrs. Weasley in tightness ad gentleness, it felt rather different. Pleasant.

Ginny suddenly blushed profoundly as her hand had slipped into his hand again on its own accord and she immediately made to pull it away. Harry without thinking about it tightened his grip on her hand, gave it a slight squeeze and caressed it a bit with his thumb before he loosened his grip and let her pull it back.

Harry suddenly found it very hard to meet Ginny's eyes and he hoped he had a severe fever, because his forehead felt red hot. Ginny however knew for a fact that Harry's face hadn't been so red only 1 minute before as she had spent hours studying it for any signs of him waking up. She considered teasing him mercilessly about it, but decided that it would definitely be wisest not to say anything as it was her who had put her hand in his in the first place – and if she was brutally honest with her self she knew that she was blushing herself. A smile formed at her lips as her mind sang out for every cell in her body to hear: "Harry caressed my hand – and he's blushing!"

Harry decide a quick change of topic (not that there really had been one in the first place) was in order, and looked up at Ginny with pleading eyes.

"… 'a'er… "

Ginny looked at him with a confused face, then a light sprang into her eyes and she immediately jumped up and hurried out of the room only to enter seconds later with a large glass of clear liquid in her hands. She put it down at the desk opposite from his bed, then turned around and helped him into a sitting position. At first it hurt a bit to move but as soon as Ginny saw the pain in his eyes she slowed down and redoubled her efforts in being gentle. She was yet again amazed by how much could be read in those huge emerald eyes of his. Pain, embarrassment, confusion and a strong part of gratefulness. There was also a flicker of something else there, but she couldn't quite put her finger on it and so she pushed the thought aside and took the water from the table and helped Harry drink.

When Harry greedily had finished the glass he smiled up at her and said weekly. "Thank you, Ginny. What are you doing here?"

"Well… " Ginny looked everywhere but at Harry. "Now Harry don't get mad at me…"

"Why would I be mad at you?" Aside from the fact that you are here puts you in even greater danger then ever Harry added in his mind, but managed to keep his face curious rather than let it show the growing irritation within him.

"I suppose you've got a right to know why your wishes were overruled like this. I walked in on an emergency Order meeting… And I kind of heard them talking about how you had stunned 2 aurors…. And somehow hurt Professor Dumbledore…" Ginny's face fell as she saw the horror rapidly creeping into Harry's face. She quickly added "He's alright Harry, just his body is old, and he needs to rest for a couple of hours in the hospital wing. Just to be sure." There was a rather long silence after this until Ginny – who looked decidedly uncomfortable all of a sudden – spoke again. "Ehmm… Harry don't get this the wrong way… But the order was discussing who was to stay with you until you woke up. I wasn't really allowed to hear, but it sounded as if they were a bit afraid of you…" Harry was close to tears by now, and Ginny tentatively slipped her small delicate hand into his and gave it a small squeeze. "They decided that the one to be here with you should be someone who you would trust without question…. So they didn't get hexed…. Their first choices were of course Ron and Hermione, but Ron was helping the twins out today with some experiments and they had a small accident, and Hermione – well she's apparently on vacation somewhere in the Mediterranean."

Ginny's voice kind of faded out after that and for a long time she just sat there her hand still slipped into Harry's afraid to move so he would let go. Harry himself was staring into nothingness silent tears running down his cheeks.

Slowly the silence was beginning to grind on Ginny's nerves and carefully choosing her words, she tentatively spoke again. "Is it really true that you stunned two aurors Harry? And why would you do that...? And Professor Dumb…." Ginny choked on her words as Harry's eyes suddenly found hers and sent her a silent plea not to ask him those things. "I…. I am not allowed to tell you Ginny. It's for your own safety. Can't you just… Just tell me about your summer?"

"Are you sure Harry? I'm here now and I think it's more important to talk about you. Why won't you talk to us Harry? We are all worried sick about you. Dumbledore comes by every now and again and tells us that you are… Well he says that you are as good as can be expected – what ever that means. Mum is really worried about you, you know. She was completely frantic after that day at St. Mungos. First she cried non stop for almost 4 hours ranting about how thin and worn out you looked. Then she started shouting at me for an hour straight because I slapped you. By the way I don't think I want to apologise for that – I think you deserved that."

Harry turned his eyes towards Ginny again, with an amused smile on his face. "Well then you might as well slap me again Gin. I have a feeling that you might wish you had the opportunity to do exactly that in a short time."

Ginny looked into Harry's eyes with a speculative look in her eyes. "Harry James Potter! What ever you are up to, you better not go trough with it. I will have your hide if you hurt Ron and Hermione any more. They are already beside themselves with worry. You should see Ron. He walks around with saggy shoulders and black circles around his eyes – and worst of all he almost never smiles. The twins have been trying to cheer him up by taking him to the shop and have him help them out with their experiments, but whenever they do something that would have the old Ron cracking up, he just smiles this sad smile and gives them a pat on the back and says _good job_. And now you better tell me what you are going to do so I know why I'm slapping you!" She added the last sentence with a merry twinkle in her eyes.

"I can't Ginny. Even if I'm pretty sure they'll obliviate you before you get to go home I just can't risk anyone knowing about my plans. It'll put every one I care about in too big danger. It'll put you in more danger and I can't live with that. I don't want to have any more lives on my consciousness" Ginny open her mouth to contradict him but Harry silenced her with a wave of his hand. "I know it's not my fault. Professor Dumbledore have helped me a lot in realising that but that still doesn't change the fact that a lot of people have died indirectly because of me. I can't take any more of that."

Ginny was silent for a little while and Harry thought he could almost hear the wheels spinning in her mind. "Do you really think they'll obliviate me Harry? I mean I'm just a kid. And it's not like I'll go running of to tell You Know Who all your plans. One would think I would be the last person they would ever expect to talk to him after what he did to me"

"I'm pretty sure they will Ginny. Actually if they weren't going to I would insist they do it. I know Dumbledore already obliviated some of the order Members who have been here. Only Dumbledore and Remus are supposed to know about this place." As an after thought and more as note to himself Harry added "Well I guess Moody, Tonks and Kingsley have been trusted with the information too…"

Ginny jumped at the opportunity as she had been told in very strong terms not to ask anything about where she was going. "Well… Where exactly are we Harry? This isn't exactly how Ron and the twins described your room at the Dursley's." She knew she wasn't allowed to ask but if she was going to be obliviated anyway… Well who cared then. Just for good measure she put up her biggest puppy dog eyes and gave Harry's hand a gentle squeeze. "Plleeeaassseee Harry. You haven't told me anything yet. You can at least show me how you live."

Harry was suddenly very happy that he wasn't standing because he found that even though he knew she was trying to manipulate him his legs simply got weak at the smile the little redhead sent him. He shook his head and made sure he was decent before he threw the covers of and tentatively swung his legs over the edge of the bed. As he swayed a little bit Ginny put a steadying hand on his elbow and Harry swore under his breath before he mumbled, "I swear I've been spending way too much time in that bed lately."

Ginny practically bounced on her feet as Harry led her towards the door out into the hallway. "Oh thank you so much for showing me Harry."

Harry quickly skipped the bathroom and let Ginny into the living room. Seeing the splendour in there had the desired effect on Ginny and while she just stood in the doorway gawping at everything Harry went over to Moody who was sitting on the couch with a worried expression on his face and whispered something in his ear. The old auror looked up at he boy with doubt in his eyes but as he saw the steely expression on his face the look changed into one of respect. As Moody got up from the couch Harry went back to Ginny's side.

"Is this really where you live Harry?" Ginny's eyes were round as teacups and it looked like she had trouble taking it all in. "This is so cool!"

"I'm sorry you won't be able to remember it Ginny…"

Ginny slowly tore her gaze away from the many suits of armour lining the walls and the expression on her face changed into something that mimicked a question mark rather well as she saw the 3 silent tears running down Harry's cheeks… "Harry…?"

"I'm sorry Ginny" Harry said and pulled her into a tight embrace. Then he softly whispered "_Stupefy!_" and Ginny's body grew slack in his arms and Harry carefully picked her up and carried her to the couch.

"That was the right thing to do Harry. I'm proud of you." Moody's voice was not as gruff as it used to be and when Harry later recollected that day it was the first time he could remember Moody ever using his first name.

"Please just make sure you obliviate her good Sir. I don't want any harm to come to her because of me." Harry turned around and headed towards the bathroom although he stopped in the door to the hallway and called over his shoulder. "I'll just take a shower and then I'll be ready to continue my training Sir." By now his voice had descended into its usual place of sheer determination.

As Harry closed the door to the bathroom he heard Moody obliviate the youngest of his best friends.


End file.
